


In the Presence of My Enemies

by Unstoppablei



Series: Psalms and Trials [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Angst, Bad Decisions, Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Cool motive still murder, Dark!Solas, Earth, Eluvians, Elvish rebellion, Emotional Manipulation, Even More Betrayal, Explicit Language, F/M, Friendship, Modern Girl in Thedas, Post: DAI, Pre-Trespasser, Recreational Drug Use, Sequel, Smut, Solas is the king of justification, Suicidal Thoughts, Tranquility, Trespasser Spoilers, Xanatos Gambits, characters to be added as they appear, secrets and lies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-26
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2018-04-17 09:05:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 40,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4660785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unstoppablei/pseuds/Unstoppablei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em> “You plow forward, heedless of the cliffs below, and I fear it may end in blood and fire.” </em>
</p>
<p>Flemeth was right as always, but Errol Kerr is not ready to die as a numb Tranquil on Earth. She will get back to Thedas, even if it ends in blood and fire, even if all she has to bargain with is her very soul.</p>
<p>She thinks she can find a way out of her deal and go home to the one she loves. She thinks she can trick the Trickster. She thinks she can <em>win</em>. She’s wrong, and now she’s in a Thedas where her friends are her enemies, her body is not her own, the Inquisition has a new leader, the elves are rising up, and the Trickster has already won.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: The Place Within

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! Welcome to Book Two of Psalms and Trials, please board the angst train in an orderly fashion.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies..._  
>  _My cup runneth over_  
>  -Psalm 23:5
> 
>  
> 
>  _Maker, my enemies are abundant_  
>  _Many are those who rise up against me_  
>  -Trials 1:1

 

They are on their backs in the green green grass, hands entwined, heads just barely touching. A breeze that smells of the first cut of spring, still tinged with frost and dusted with daffodils, brushes over his face and ruffles his hair. The sky is blue and endless, but also somehow close, like a bubble with a curve he can't see.

Cullen runs his thumb over hers and feels her breathing next to him. "Four months," he says, tilting his head, nose in her hair. She feels as real as a human but still has never visited him outside of the Fade since that first night. It feels like it has been longer than four months; it feels like it has been four years, four decades.

"Is that how long it's been?"

"Exactly."

She sighs. "I lose track of time."

"How goes the hunt?"

She rolls over so that she is half on top of him and he draws his arm around her, her chin propped on his chest. "He's searching for any ancient temples that still stand," she says. "Many don't. He's been traveling to places where he hopes the temples are, but finding only forest or dust." She grins, wickedly. "He's _pissed_."

"Any idea why?"

She shrugs. "Power, I think. Artifacts. Things to hoard, to keep himself alive when he… does whatever he's going to do. It's taking him longer than he wanted. Plans and schemes." She huffs, blowing a strand of white hair away from her face. "The ass."

He laughs a little and pulls her up for a kiss. "You'll hear no disagreement from me."

She kisses him again, then combs her fingers through his hair. "And you?"

"The pitying looks have calmed a bit, but I found two women and a man naked in my quarters today, already… well, it doesn't matter. I had to pay them to leave. They were quite insistent."

She giggles so hard that she snorts. "So who do you think, Bull or Dorian?"

"My money is on Zevran, actually. Last week it was Dorian. I came upstairs and the room was filled with the strangest... you know what, we won't talk about it."

She laughs again, louder. "You're all red! I'll have to invade Dorian's dreams and tell him to knock it off. He at least should know better. _He_ knows I'm not really gone."

"He's just doing it to get a rise out of me."

"Double entendre."

"I—"

"You're red again."

"Oh, just shut up and kiss me."

She complies, tugging lightly at his hair as he bends his head down to hers. He meets her mouth eagerly, as if by kissing her hard enough he can pour out all of his frustrations: the never-ending ache of not truly having her by his side, of having to pretend to be bereft, the forever whispers by Cassandra and others of _"are you okay?"_ , the not knowing if this in-between situation will ever change, if she will ever return to him whole in the real world, if he will ever hold her outside of the Fade under the real sun…

His tongue is in her mouth, his arms crushing her to his chest, and she is whimpering needfully, legs tangled up in his, and even like this, fake and Fade and spirit, he loves her more than he has ever loved anything.

The breeze picks up, so softly at first that he barely notices it. Then the blue sky darkens, like night come too soon, with clouds that swirl overhead in a great funnel. The wind strengthens, gushing across his skin like water, and she pushes away to gawk upwards.

It would be full dark now except for the sick, swirling green. It peels at the edges of the sky, flaking and breaking away.

"Maker's breath, what is that?" he breathes, sitting up.

"It looks like… like the Breach," she says shakily. She suddenly seems less real, more like a ghost he can touch. "Only smaller. I— ah!" She grips his hand, hard. "Can you feel it?"

"Feel what?" Above them, it is spinning faster and tighter, a cyclone of raw smoke and energy.

"It's pulling!" she cries, grabbing onto his shirt, and he feels her start to lift off of the ground. "It's— no!" Her feet fly up to the sky and he grabs her forearms, holding her steady. "Don't let me go!"

"I won't!" he shouts, the noise of the thing a yawning moan, the trees bending in its wake, though he remains untouched. "What's happening?"

"It's trying to send me back!" she howls, and he's never seen her more afraid. Her white hair is a halo around her head, her eyes huge and neck bared like a wild mare. "It's not possible, I should be dead there! Please, please don't let go!"

"I won't!" he yells again, even as he feels his fingers slipping, the Breach a howling, sucking maw. "It won't take you!"

His hands slide from her forearms to her wrists. "Cullen, _please_!"

"Errol!" he screams, trying to grip her more tightly and failing. The wind is too strong; she is nearly perpendicular now, her feet slipping into the vortex.

"I'll find a way back!" she promises, her voice clogged with tears. "Somehow! I promise! I'll find a way back to you! No matter what!"

He's now gripping just her fingers. "Errol, don't leave me!" he begs. "Just hold on a little longer!"

"Cullen, I love—"

She screams, and he screams too, and with a clap like thunder she is wrenched from him, and he is left grasping at nothing as she spirals into the Breach, and when it has eaten her up it seals itself like it never was and Cullen wakes gasping and alone and knows, in his bones, that she is truly gone.

 


	2. A Grave Disservice

 

 

Broehain Kerr watched his daughter take her first stuttering breaths on her own. Her face was bloodless, the strange man's hands, gnarled with age, still pressed to her chest. He felt more than saw the green aura suffuse her as a thick rope of blood dripped from her nose.

Her mouth dropped open, and a slow gasp rattled up from her lungs. Joanna gripped his hand tight, tiny sobs leaking from her mouth. "I can't believe it," she whispered. "Our baby."

John was at the back of the room, taping the whole thing with his phone. Broehain made a mental note to confiscate it, before this whole mess made it onto the internet.

Errol's eyes fluttered madly behind closed lids, her lips working. "...find…" she whimpered, and there was blood there too, seeping from the corner of her mouth. "... no matter… Culle…"

The wound in her neck was nothing but a faint scar, but now another mark joined it, like the half-healed bite of an animal. There was also a fresh scar on the splayed palm of her left hand; it welled up, a jagged thing, crusted and weeping. She twitched and cried out, her brow scrunched, as if she was in so much pain it was unbearable.

Broehain was just thankful she was alive.

The elderly man finally turned and stared up at Broehain with something approaching pity. He spoke in a slow, thickened Norwegian dialect.

The translator listened. "He says that you have done your daughter a great disservice. He says that she will live… the translation is imperfect, but roughly, a half life now, stripped of her connection to…" The translator shook his head. "I can't understand the word. Now he's saying it's almost like... calm? Serene? No… tranquil? What does that mean?" He spoke quickly to the man. "I can't make it out. He just says you should not have done this, and pride will be your downfall. But his final debt is paid. He can be called upon no more, and the consequences are on your head." The translator glanced between all of them and twisted his mouth. "This is definitely one of the weirdest jobs I've ever had."

"Thank you," Broehain said softly, to both of them. He turned to the translator. "Have you been able to get him to say how he knows the doctor… who this mutual friend is?"

The translator shook his head again. "A man he owed a final debt to. That's all he'll say." He looked over, to where the elderly man was already shuffling away, muttering to himself. "I don't even know how that guy managed to get through customs. Do you know he had a reindeer skull in his carry on luggage? Weird shit. I gotta get him to the airport." He handed Broehain his card. "Hey, give me a call if you ever need anything else. This was wild."

They vanished into the hallway as Doctor Hunt came back in. He had left the room for the duration, so he could 'legally disavow any knowledge' of what was happening. He leaned over the bed and smiled.

"It seems our patient has made a miraculous recovery," he said. "What a relief."

"Doctor—" Broehain started, but Doctor Hunt shook his head, cutting him off before he could even start.

"We've gone over this, Mr. Kerr. I've done for you what I've done for no one else. Your daughter is here, alive, when she should have died. Be thankful for that, but I can't answer your questions. It's a miracle. Let it stay a miracle." He then proceeded to look her over, prying open her eyelids and checking her pulse. "She'll be in the hospital for a few weeks yet," he said, his tone once again very clinical. "We'll want to monitor her progress before we release her. These first few days are the most dangerous, and she'll be weak for some time yet, but with luck she should be able to live a long and healthy life." He nodded at them briskly. "I'll get her files set up for her new situation. A nurse will be in shortly. Good day, Mr. and Mrs. Kerr."

He left the room. Joanna sank onto one of the plastic chairs, gripping her rosary. John, still gangly and awkward at fifteen, lingered behind her, his hand on her shoulder.

"I'll believe it when she wakes up," Joanna said in a hushed voice. "All of this magic mumbo jumbo… I'll believe it when my baby wakes up."

Broehain sighed and rubbed his temples. "John, give me your phone, I'm deleting that footage," he said shortly. "Joanna, Errol will be fine, I don't see how this _magic mumbo jumbo_ is different from prayer. I'm going to get us food from the cafeteria."

He stomped away, John's phone in his trembling hand, and stopped on the way to the cafeteria to buy a pack of cigarettes. He hadn't smoked in fifteen years, but he walked the prerequisite two blocks from the hospital and lit up, feeling the smoke mix with the pollen from the cherry blossoms in his lungs, the spring air thick and cloying.

He had saved his daughter from certain death. He knew he had done the right thing.

So why did he feel like he had just killed her?

* * *

When she first woke she didn't know where she was. She thought perhaps she had been injured and was in Skyhold, resting in her quarters, Cullen by her side.

Then she remembered that she hadn't been at Skyhold in months, at least not in reality, and that nothing on Thedas smelled like this, of antiseptic and the false cold of air-conditioning. Nothing in the Fade hurt like her body did, hurt like a heart beating in a chest that wasn't used to having a heart beat inside of it, of nerves that weren't used to carrying signals, of eyes that weren't used to contracting or dilating. A real, human body.

And nothing there could ever sound like her mother's voice, hushed and whispered, reciting something, the creak of a plastic chair as she rocked back and forth, the shiver of rosary beads clinking against each other.

"He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me beside the still waters," her mother whispered from memory. "He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me." Her mother hiccuped. "He is with her, she fears no evil." A broken sob, and then her mother took up the verse again.

Errol wondered if the numbness in her brain was a result of the drugs they were pumping through her. Surely she should be feeling something by now: panicked, tearful, or at least the desire to comfort. But there was nothing, just a cool blank stretch with only her memories to guide her.

A whisper of a memory, Cassandra fierce and distrustful in the snow long ago, one of the first things she ever said to her.

" _If you have a God, you might want to be praying to them now."_

Errol still didn't know if she had a God, especially now that she knew that real Gods existed and some of them were assholes. But she thought of the things that Cullen murmured when he thought she was sleeping, when she spied him in the Chantry, his faith something clean and pure despite everything tainted, and she remembered.

Why did she feel so numb?

" _If you have a God, you might want to be praying to them now."_

Her voice was a hoarse rasp, and it sounded like a death rattle, without intonation. It seemed familiar, but she couldn't place it, like she'd heard that flat sound somewhere before. "Though all before me is shadow, yet shall the Maker be my guide. I shall not be left to wander the drifting roads of the Beyond. For there is no darkness in the Maker's Light, and nothing that He has wrought shall be lost."

Still, nothing. A flicker, perhaps, at the edges. Was it the drugs? She felt so empty. Her eyes opened in time to see her mother drop her rosary and bend over the bed with a cry of relief. Should she feel relief, too?

She wasn't sure.

Then her father was there, or had he been there the whole time, and her mother was weeping, and asking, _What was she saying? Those words?_ and her father was twisting his mouth with something that looked like relief or regret, and he touched her face and said _My Errol, are you really here?_ and all Errol could ask was:

"How long has it been?"

"Six days since you first woke up," her mother said tremulously. "Three days since that man brought you back, and you were gone for three after that… that _monster_ stabbed you. I thought, oh, I thought…"

"Joanna," her father warned, and her mother fell silent.

Three days here, while four months had passed there. Time truly was fluid.

Errol looked at her father, away from the sopping wetness of her mother's face. His was tighter, controlled, every muscle tensed, but his eyes...

"Why can't I feel anything?"

When he said nothing she asked, for clarification: "Is it the drugs?"

He just kept looking at her with that kicked puppy look, and Errol's heart beat steadily, painfully, inside her newly healed chest. "Father, what did you do to me?"

He curled his hand around the back of her head and kissed her forehead, his lips like a brand, and said softly, "I brought you home, baby girl."

And Errol said, thoughtfully: "Ah," and understood, and felt nothing.

There was no Fade on Earth. That had meant nothing before, when she hadn't known anything else, when she hadn't yet touched magic or spirits, before she first reached for that staff so long ago and felt the world open up. But now she was different, her soul a ragged, broken thing that didn't belong here anymore.

Perhaps, then, she would feel nothing ever again.

* * *

She was in the hospital for fifteen days.

The light in the room never seemed to change, no matter what time of day it was or the weather outside. The food was terrible, but she didn't care. Her parents brought her her favorite outside food, and she ate it dutifully, but she didn't care. They spoke to her in the careful, gentle voices one used to speak to the ill or elderly, and she answered them in a flat, monotone voice, and didn't care. She tried not to think about it too much. She tried not to think about that word. There was something there, a tiny pinprick of something, when she thought about that word.

Tranquil.

Was that what she was? Why then, did she shy away from it? Did that mean something? She wasn't sure.

The light never changed in the room. The flowers on the dresser meant nothing to her. Why wasn't she happy to see her parents, her brother? She loved them, didn't she?

But they were so different from her, with their soft hands and faces. Her hands and face and body were soft now too, not battle hardened. They were so different. She browsed the internet, found nothing of interest, closed the laptop they gave her. Tried video games, books, stopped. Nothing helped. She stared out the window, her mind blank. Thought of a sunburst on her forehead. Wished it was there so at least people would know. But people here wouldn't know.

Then they gave her a new iPod, with all of her old music on it. She listened to it, and felt nothing, but certain songs wove memories.

" _I'm hooked on a feeling  
I'm high on believing_ _—"_

_(Oh yeah, I like this Ooga Chaka!) dancing like they'd never danced before because they hadn't, everything bright and new and strange for them_ —

" _And the players gonna play play play play play_  
_And the haters gonna hate hate hate hate hate_  
_I'm just gonna _—"__

_(Please, come and speak to me when you are properly attired) his voice a hoarse rasp, want in his eyes_ —

And then there were other songs that just brought up something, something she couldn't place, not memories but—

_"Howling ghosts, they reappear_  
_In mountains that are stacked with fear_  
_But you're a King and I'm a Lionheart"_

She reached up, wonderingly, and touched wetness on her face. Why was she crying?

_"I'm not calling you a liar, just don't lie to me_  
_I'm not calling you a thief, just don't steal from me_  
_I'm not calling you a ghost, just stop haunting me_  
_And I—"_

Her heart stuttered, sharp like glass, and she fumbled, turning the iPod off and shoving it away. It only lasted a moment before the numbness sank back in, but it was enough to recognize.

Loss. Pain. Fear. Betrayal.

Love.

She wasn't completely Tranquil then — this world had enough magic to have an Eluvian, to have scraps of magic at its poles, the Northern Lights glossing over the uppermost horizons like effervescent curtains. It had enough to give her glimpses of emotion.

She pondered this, clinically, looking out of the hospital window into the grey drizzle outside.

So now what?

* * *

The next time she felt something was the day they brought her home.

Her parents were paying for her studio apartment, but for now she was staying with them, in her childhood bedroom, which was luckily on the first floor as she was still in a wheelchair for safety's sake. They wheeled her in and then dropped something small and wiggly into her lap, watching her blank eyes for any reaction.

Her hand automatically came up to its fierce little face, and it started to gnaw on her finger. Its paws were huge, as were its ears, its body black and belly white.

"You always wanted a big dog," her mom said hopefully. "This one will be huge."

"He's all yours. What do you want to name him?" her dad asked.

Errol ran her left hand down his back, feeling the useless scar catch on his soft fur, and felt a momentary bubble of something like joy in her chest. It was like grasping at the wind, and didn't last long, but it was there in the sharp pain of tiny teeth.

Another memory reared its head, the scent of the tavern almost washing over her.

_'Hey, who you callin' tiny?'_

_'You call me Tiny all the time.'_

_'Yeah, but that's different, I'm being_ ironic _.'_

"Tiny," she said, looking at the small pup and thinking of the giant Qunari and the smart-mouthed dwarf who had coined the nickname. "His name is Tiny."

"You always did like irony," her dad said, raising his eyebrows, but he seemed pleased that she was showing any emotion.

It didn't last long, but the numbness seemed less omnipresent when Tiny was around, even though he chewed her fingers raw and barked until her ears rang. It especially helped at night, when he curled in a small ball at her chest, and was still there when she woke gasping, her body now different from theirs and unable to dream in a world without a Fade, so that falling asleep was just falling, down down down into blackness, never ending and deep and terrible, a hole so dark she forgot her own name until she woke and felt his warm little body again.

She would whisper their nicknames then, into the shadows, because even numbed she couldn't bear to say their real names, couldn't bear to break that barrier between worlds. She would bury her lips into the fuzzy ear of the puppy and breathe: "Tiny. Sparkler. Buttercup. Kid. Seeker. Iron Lady. Hero. Ruffles. Nightingale. The Storyteller." And then last, barely a breath: "Chuckles. Curly." Her eyes closed, brow drawn tight. "Sunshine."

She never slept after that, just started over again, whispering names and waiting for dawn, Tiny's small form a barrier against the dark.

And then, just on the cusp of summer, she had a visitor.

 


	3. Visitations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Whew! Trespasser was a trip and a half! I am happy as a Marabi in mud and it gave me great writing fodder. A few things threw me for a loop, but nothing I can't work around, and now I have the whole second book set up quite neatly in my head. Now if only DA4 wasn't like 4-5 years away..._
> 
> _Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed/kudoed/bookmarked so far! I'm so glad you're enjoying the story, angst and all!_

 

**Visitations**

 

 

"Errol?" The door swung open, the hinges squeaking. "Someone's here to see you."

Errol sighed, reluctantly turning from her view of the garden. Didn't they know by now that she didn't want to be bothered? The light was golden outside; it reminded her of the light there, and it reminded her of what it was like to feel, before all of the edges were covered by a soft blanket of nothing, blunted and dulled. "What?"

Someone edged into her childhood room, hair big in the summer humidity, smile nervous, nails bitten to the quick. "Hey girl."

Errol's eyes widened. "Jules?"

The smaller girl lost her shy demeanor and launched herself onto Errol's lap, hands linked tight around Errol's neck. She curled up like a kitten, knees hitting Errol's chin. "I _missed_ you, bestie," she said plaintively. "Why'd you have to go and almost die on me? Who said you were allowed to do that?"

Dimly Errol realized the door had shut and they were alone. She allowed her hands to rest on her friend's back. "Jules?" she said again, a bit fuzzily. She felt… something. "You're here."

Jules looked up at her, scowling. "I tried to come and see you in the hospital but they said you wouldn't see anyone," she said. "I wanted to sneak in but with the flying all the way from New York I couldn't risk that jumping out of a cake wouldn't work." She poked Errol in the chest. "You're supposed to smile at that."

"Jules," Errol said again, a bit breathless, and hugged her friend tighter, nose in her hair. "I can feel it. I missed you. I… I named my staff after you."

"Yeah, whatever that means," Jules said, sniffling. Suddenly she drew back, as if noticing the bandages for the first time. "Shit, I didn't hurt you, did I?"

"No," Errol said, shaking her head. She paused. "But maybe you should sit on the bed."

"Right." Jules scrambled off of her and perched on the edge of the mattress. "Christ, Errol, you look like a fuckin' ghost ate you and then shit you out and then ate you again."

"Lovely imagery."

"You look… bad."

"Thanks."

"You're skinny. Creepy skinny."

"You are too, wench."

"Bitch." Jules smiled fondly for a moment, but then it faded. "So… what really happened? I keep hearing garbled tales and you know the media is having a field day with this. Well, was, it's been a couple'a weeks. They've moved on to bigger things now."

Errol toyed with her necklace. "So you've seen the video?"

"Blurry, yeah. Still can't believe someone at the hospital leaked it."

She pulled the hidden flash drive from its pendant and held it out. "Here. In all its gory goodness."

"You made it into a necklace? Creepy."

Errol touched the scar on her left hand, the jagged one that did nothing and felt like old dead skin. The one on her neck was covered with a thick bandage, even though it no longer wept blood; she couldn't stand to look at it. "So I know I'm not crazy."

Jules took the drive and popped it into Errol's laptop. After a few minutes she let out a long breath. "Shit, son. That is fucked up. The dude's in a psych ward, yah?"

"Yah. Shouldn't be. Wasn't him."

Jules looked at her warily. "So you believe it. Like your dad. That he isn't crazy. That he was…"

She trailed off. Errol sighed. "You can say the word. Possessed. He was possessed. I believe it." She hesitated, then said, "there's another file, hidden within the first. John showed me how to do it so my dad wouldn't find it. He uploaded the video to the Cloud before my dad could wipe his phone. It's gone now, for good, except for right here. Give that to me."

Jules dutifully handed over the laptop and Errol fiddled with it before handing it back. After a few moments, the shaky video began to play, and Jules' eyes went wide as she watched the old man hover over Errol's body and the life seep back into her even as new wounds welled up and cut themselves into her skin.

"Oh… dear me," she said, so taken aback it was like she ran out of expletives. "This is… what is this?"

"Proof. That no one can ever see. I won't be on TV, Jules."

"Right, right, of course not." Jules handed the flash drive back and closed the laptop, then chewed on the ragged tip of her thumb, deep in thought. "Okay. Here's what we're going to do." She rummaged through the bag she had tossed on the bed in her leap to get to Errol, finally pulling out a small ziplock bag filled with something green. "We're going to smoke an absolutely outlandish amount of weed and you are going to tell me everything, start to finish, no detail too small. You hear me?"

Errol couldn't help herself— she laughed. It was the first time she laughed since being here, since most emotion was stripped from her and drowned in a sea of Tranquility from which she could only take short, gasping breaths. "Okay, Julesy," she said. "Yeah, I'll tell you. I'll tell you everything."

"Perfect," Jules said. She pulled out a travel vaporizer, already filled, clicked it on, and handed it to Errol. "I'm waiting."

Errol moved to the bed and sat cross-legged next to her friend before taking a long pull and holding it in her lungs, the smoke warm, the smell familiar. When she let it out she coughed a little, but she breathed easier. She was still drowning, but the surface was closer. She took another pull. "It has everything: Magic, mystery, romance, betrayal, ancient gods, elves, demons, magical mirrors, a dwarf who writes porn, a hole in the sky, a spirit who becomes mostly human, true love between a giant guy with horns and one eye and a sworn magical enemy of his people…"

"I thought you were going to tell me the true story," Jules interjected.

Errol opened her left hand, the useless scar deep and still impressive. "I am going to tell you the true story. And by the time we're finished, you'll be so high you might actually believe me."

* * *

Jules was flat on her back, head hanging off of the bed, slowly eating one of Errol's mother's cookies by the time Errol finished her story. It was fully dark, the only light in the room one small lamp, and Errol's head felt fuzzy and strange and she wanted to laugh and weep at the same time, like a fog of emotion was battling back the numbness but the numbness didn't want to let go.

"Fuck, dude," Jules said hazily. "You promise you're not shitting me?"

"Pinky swear."

"And you really love this Cullen guy?"

Errol buried her face in her hands, wishing she could feel more, willing that love to fill her heart again and finding only scattered remnants. "I did… I do. When I can feel, I do. More than anything. I'm… I'm drowning here, Julesy. I don't know how much longer I'll last."

"This is insane, you know. Like, lock you up, dope you up on meds insane."

"I know."

"But I saw the tapes. And I'm super high right now." She sat up, surveying Errol's face. "And you're not right. In the face and the voice and the brain. You're not… you. It's like your soul's been sucked out of your mouth, dementor style. And… I think I might believe you." She closed her eyes and shook her head. "I mean, it doesn't make sense, but what else does? That you just tripped face first into a river and had a vivid dream? I saw what that crazy old man did and those scars that just… appeared." She eyed the one on Errol's neck, where Errol had peeled the bandage back during her storytelling. "Fuck, it really does look like an animal bite." She flopped back down on the bed. "You're messing with my brain, girl."

"Sorry."

"No!" Jules said, pointing her finger at the ceiling. "You're supposed to respond with a witty quip! This isn't right! Argh!" She rolled over on her stomach so that she was resting her chin on her knuckles and regarded Errol intensely. "So, what do you intend to do about it?"

Errol regarded her evenly, her cookie sitting ignored on her lap. "Do about it?"

"Well, you can't stay here. I have a feeling I'd have to start sweeping your room for pointy objects soon."

Errol winced. She wasn't entirely wrong. "The only possible way I know of getting back is through an Eluvian — a, uh, magic mirror. But it's under the ice somewhere in Antarctica. And even if I could somehow find it I don't know the key to get through."

"Yeah, you mentioned that. There was a camera there, though, right? Which means someone's found it. Find them, find the Eluvenunananan."

Errol blinked, the fuzziness in her head hard to overcome. "That's… shit." She leaned back, staring up at nothing. "Shit. You're right. There's got to be like, a team, or something, or… shit. But how would I…"

Jules shrugged and reached for another cookie. "Damned if I know. I just gave you step one of Operation: Get You Back to Fairyworld. I've done my duty. Got any milk?"

* * *

In the end, it was a matter of legwork. The next day, Errol and Jules split the workload, combing through organizations and universities with a focus on research in Antarctica. Most of the organizations were affiliated with the government or NGOs, but even they tended to collaborate with professors. The National Science Foundation, The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research, The United States Antarctic Research Program… and that was just a fraction of the organizations in the US alone.

There were no recent press releases boasting of miraculous discoveries in the Antarctic, so they were flying blind, but both women had experience reaching out to press contacts. After a few hours they had a neat Google Doc with the names and numbers of media reps for every organization and university working within those organizations they could find. They divvied up the workload and, under the guise of working for a new science magazine, started making calls and leaving messages.

"Hi, my name is Errol Kerr, I'm a writer with _New Nature Now_ ," Errol said, leaving a voicemail for the dozenth time over the phone, her voice flat and exhausted. "We're an up-and-coming magazine and we're doing a special on the Antarctic. I'm wondering if you've had any teams there recently, or even now, that might be able to chat with me for a few minutes over the phone…"

Several of the media reps got back to them, and some of the scientists as well; Errol even got to speak with someone currently at a research station. But no one said anything that triggered her interest, and the hints she dropped made them think she was crazy more than anything else.

She was exhausted by the end of the day, her voice hoarse from overuse, her head pounding, the numbness inside of her telling her to just give it all up. Jules slept in her bed like old times; they curled up together in a puppy pile, safe and secure, the smaller girl fitting neatly under Errol's chin, Tiny sprawled at the foot of the bed. Jules smelled like childhood, like the same shampoo and Burt's Bees lip balm as always, and something instinctively Jules, a smell Errol would know blindfolded, of a middle school of skinned knees and a high school of sneaking out of the house and a college of huddling in the library until 3AM. She smelled the same as the time she had pelted rocks at the boys making fun of Errol for her acne, as the time Errol had punched Tommy Elson in the nose for calling Jules a slut in the ninth grade, like the time they got drunk off of wine coolers when they were fifteen and the time Jules stayed with the Kerrs for six months because her dad had backhanded her again. Jules was her sister, more than John was her brother, more than blood.

Errol listened to Jules' steady breathing and wondered what it would be like if she wasn't half Tranquil. Would she stay here, with the people who loved her so much they dragged her back kicking and screaming? Would she get a new job, move to New York to be near Jules, try and find a new love? Would she live in peace, raise Tiny, raise a family, fully human, and grow old remembering her glory days in Thedas as some kind of muddled dream?

It was a fruitless question, but an important one to consider, there in the dark, clutching her best friend like a lifeline. If she could stay, if it wasn't so bleak, would she?

Errol thought of Cullen's wry half-smile, the feel of his skin beneath hers, the smell of that world, Fade and clean air and metal and even the dirt, and of Varric calling her Sunshine and Dorian's sharp tongue, Cassandra's gentle heart, Cole's hand in hers, Iron Bull's full laugh and the feel of a fight, blood pumping roughly through her veins, and the sun rising over Skyhold…

There it was again, that prickle of emotion, just there, just out of reach, and she knew. No. She would always leave here, no matter the circumstances. She would take Jules with her if she could (and she would ask, if this mad plan ever worked, though she knew instinctively that Jules would say no, because she knew Jules) but Errol had no place here anymore.

Her place was in Thedas, with them. With the Inquisition. And she would find a way back, or die.

The phone rang.

Jules jerked awake. "Whatizzit?" she asked. "What… time? Phone? What?"

Errol grabbed the phone. 5AM. A London number.

She swiped and held it up to her ear. "Hello?"

"Good morning, is this Ms. Kerr?"

"...Yes?"

"Ah, excellent. My name is Dr. Albert Kensington, I'm with the Antarctic Research… oh, shit, is that the hour? I'm so sorry, I've woken you, haven't I? My sense of time is a mess." The man's posh British voice sounded endearingly bumbling when he cursed.

Errol sat up and raked her shorn hair back from her head. "No, it's fine, I was awake. Kind of. Thank you for calling me."

"Of course, of course, I'm always willing to speak with someone interested in our work. In fact, I just returned from Argentina a few days ago."

"Argentina?"

"I often work from a station there where I monitor our winter Antarctic team. During this time of year it's just a skeleton crew on the main base — the weather's too bad to get anyone in or out. I'm in New York now, for a symposium, if you'd be interested in speaking in person."

"Oh, that would be lovely, but I'm in Seattle."

"Right right, of course. Pity. Well, I'm all ears now. What kind of questions did you have for me?"

Errol decided to jump right in. No use beating around the bush at 5AM. "Has your team made any interesting discoveries?"

"The biologists have found a few underground lakes, untouched for millions of years. They're very excited to get samples of that water."

"The biologists? What are you, then?"

"I'm an archaeologist."

"What is an archeologist doing in Antarctica?"

He laughed. "Being foolish, if my colleagues have anything to say about it. But it wasn't always a frozen wasteland. I'm convinced there must be some legacy left of prehistoric peoples, though it's an… outside view in the scientific community."

Errol perked up. "Have you found anything to support this theory?"

"Unfortunately, I can't speak of our research in depth at the moment, but—"

"Please, Dr. Kensington, did you find anything? A room maybe, under the ice? Round, with a mirror in it, and flowers blooming at the base, and statues?"

There was silence at the other end. Errol waited. "Hello?"

"Who are you?" he finally asked sharply. "Is this some kind of joke? Who told you this?"

"You did, didn't you?" she breathed.

"Young lady, if this is some kind of threat to my research—"

"No threat," she said quickly. "I just want to meet with you. I can tell you about it. Please, it's what I've been searching for."

"No one knows about that room except for my personal team," he snapped. "You are either a thief or a competitor or a highly inappropriate prankster."

"I'm none of these things, I'm—"

Her phone started buzzing. She glanced down at it and saw that he was attempting to Facetime her. Errol clicked the light on, Jules hovering over her shoulder, and accepted the call.

After a few moments a man peered back at her. He looked to be in his late forties and had a weathered face with sparse hair and a small pair of wire-rimmed glasses perched on the edge of his nose. Errol waved at him tentatively.

"Hi."

He sniffed. "I wanted to see who was poking their nose around—" He looked at her more closely, his eyes going wide, and pushed his glasses up his nose. His mouth thinned. "How did you come by this information, Ms. Kerr?"

"It's a long story. A really long story. If we could maybe meet, somehow, I'd fly out to you… it's really, really important that I meet you, I promise I'm not a thief, or crazy."

He stared at her a few seconds longer. "Yes," he said shortly. "There is an organization near Seattle that has been clamoring for me to come and speak with them for quite some time now. When the symposium wraps up in three days I can take a day or two and fly out and make time to meet with you. I'll text you the details."

Errol nodded. "Yes, of course, I—"

"Ms. Kerr," he interrupted. "I beg of you not to speak of this to anyone, the topic or the meeting. And I expect punctuality." He looked over his shoulder. "I must be going. Have a good day."

The call ended.

They sat in silence. Jules was the first to speak.

"Well, it's a lead," she said. "A big one. But I don't trust that guy. He changed his tune really quickly once he saw your face. Creepy. Maybe he runs a prostitution ring." She waited a beat. "This is where you tell me that joking about prostitution rings isn't funny."

"Joking about prostitution rings isn't funny," Errol said flatly.

"Are you excited? Nervous?"

"No. I just know I have to go back."

Jules frowned at her. "It's just… you faked emotion really well on the phone."

"I remember it, even when I can't feel it. And I need this to work."

"I don't trust him."

"You already said that."

"And I won't be here to protect you."

Errol looked at her. "Why would I need protecting?"

Jules sighed and wrapped her arm around her best friend. "Questions like that are exactly why you need protecting."

The phone buzzed as the text came through. A date and time and place. Three days from then at a local university. Errol gripped the phone so tightly she thought the glass would crack.

Maybe she felt something after all.

 


	4. Hunt and Kensington

 

"And how is my favorite patient?"

"You say that to all the girls."

With a joking tone, that would have sounded teasing, but with Errol's flat voice it almost sounded like an accusation. She didn't mean it to, but Dr. Hunt cleared his throat awkwardly and sat down behind his desk, ruffling through paperwork, suddenly serious.

"You're here without your parents today." He glanced at her cane. "How's physical therapy coming?"

"Fine. Just a limp, really. Muscle soreness, you know."

"Just take it easy and don't push yourself too hard. How are you feeling?"

Errol shrugged. "I'm here."

He looked at her carefully, and seemed disconcerted. "Yes, I suppose you are." He turned back to his paperwork. "Painkillers working okay?"

"Fine. I feel like I could cut down on them a little." She stared at the plaque on the front of his desk. _Dr. M Hunt._ "What does the M stand for?"

"I— what?"

"Your name."

"Oh, it's—" He shifted nervously, as if embarrassed. "If you really must know, it's Michael." He paused, waiting. "You can see why I don't advertise it."

Errol tilted her head. "It's a normal name."

"Well, yes, but when you're in school and your nickname is Mike—" He stopped and flushed. "You know, if you don't get it I'm really not explaining it to you. Let's get on with the exam, shall we?"

Errol obediently let him shine a light in her eyes and prod her with various instruments for a few minutes while he asked her questions. It was when he was gently examining the new, yet old-looking scar on her left hand with curiosity that she broached the subject.

"What can you tell me about the man who healed me?"

Dr. Hunt looked up, blinking. "I— oh. Him. He, I— as I told your father, I can't say much, I'm afraid." He dropped her hand. "There's not much to say. I know of him only through a friend. He's a sort of spiritual healer from Norway, but what he does somehow actually works. He used to help… more, on the really bad cases. Not frequently, but enough. Then, my friend said the healer was... retiring basically. I thought I'd never see him again."

"Why did he help this time?"

"I don't know. I didn't think he would. But your father begged, and what happened to you was so… so… _otherworldly_ , that I asked. And my friend somehow got him to come in time." He shook his head. "You're very lucky, young lady. One more day and you would have been dead, life support or no."

"Lucky," Errol said flatly, emotion pricking like a needle in her heart.

 _I want you to have it,_ the memory whispered, the ghost of a coin pressed into her palm. _For luck._

One more day and she could have stayed.

"Can I speak to this friend of yours?" she asked, and the doctor shook his head.

"I'm sorry, but no. It's part of our bargain. If any of this got out, he'd be swarmed with requests for the healer to solve everyone's problems. You understand."

"I do," Errol said. Dr. Hunt looked at her oddly.

"You don't sound disappointed."

"I'm saving up my emotional energy for later," she said flatly, and it was the truth. It was hard, acting normal, putting variation into her voice and face, remembering how inflections went, how her muscles were supposed to slide together to form expressions, and she wasn't going to waste it on him.

Dr. Hunt frowned. "Have you seen the psychologist we recommended?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Please finish your examination, Doctor. I'll make an appointment soon." That was a lie.

He met her eyes, then looked away, like something he saw in them made him uncomfortable. He finished his examination in near silence.

"It seems you're progressing well, though it'll be a few months before the headaches stop and before you can walk without any pain," he said, standing and resting his hands on his stethoscope. "I still have no explanation for some of these scars, but they've healed well. I'll walk you to the front desk and write you a few more scripts for your medications."

Errol stood as well and nodded. "Thank you." She paused at the doorway, her hand resting on the frame. "I just got it. The joke. Your parents shouldn't have named you that."

He laughed ruefully and scratched the side of his nose as he fell into step beside her, their footsteps and the _tick_ of Errol's cane echoing down the halls. "Believe me, I'm aware. I had friends growing up, well, one friend in particular, who simply wouldn't let it go. I resented the hell out of him for it, too." He said this with the fondness and nostalgia of a man looking back at his wilder years.

"What did you do?"

"I became a medical doctor, and make quadruple what he does. I'd say that about evens out the scales, don't you?" The front desk came into view and he stiffened slightly. "Ah, but I shouldn't be saying that to patients." He took the papers from the receptionist and signed them with a flourish before handing them to Errol. "You have a strange way about you, Ms. Kerr. I almost feel like I'm talking to myself."

She tucked the scripts into her purse. "Don't mind me. Have a good day, Dr. Hunt."

With that she padded out of the hospital and into the bright hot sunlight, the air not yet thick with the humidity of summer. She glanced at her watch. She'd make it there in plenty of time.

* * *

The office was small and cramped and had no name on the door. It was a glorified closet, with stacks of boxes surrounding a desk, one very old computer, and two chairs.

Sitting in one of them was Dr. Kensington. He had shoved the ancient computer to the side and was plucking diligently at his Macbook with a frown, glancing occasionally at a sheaf of papers next to him for reference. It wasn't until Errol knocked lightly on the open door that he looked up.

"It's you," he said, tucking his papers into a worn briefcase. There was a certain odd reverence to his voice. His gaze swept over her figure as if confirming the fact. "Yes, yes it is indeed. Please, come in and sit, and close the door behind you."

Errol complied. She limped inside and sat in the uncomfortable wooden chair and tried to remember how to school her features into something other than _blank._ "It's a pleasure to meet you, Dr. Kensington," she said, holding out her right hand, her cane clutched in the other. She hoped her eyes crinkled properly when she smiled. She had practiced in the mirror before she came. Jules said it was creepy when they didn't.

"The pleasure is all mine," he said, shaking her hand. He was dressed in a tweed jacket over a white collared shirt, his tie slightly stained and askew, almost a parody of the absentminded British professor. "I'm sorry if I was short with you on the phone. You can understand my surprise and hesitance. This project, this discovery, has been of great importance and secrecy. I was shocked. Terrified that someone had gotten ahold of my research, would use it against me or publish it before me. My life's work… gone in a flash."

"I understand," she said in what she hoped was a soothing tone. "But… why do you seem to trust me now? You're… enthusiastic." What she wanted to say was that he very much reminded her of Tiny when he got his teeth in a new bone.

"Your description of the Cavern," Kensington said, drumming his fingers on the desk, an anxious motion. "I… oh, I'll just come out and say it. It's because you were there before, isn't it?"

She met his eyes, a thread of genuine surprise breaking through her barrier of numbness. He saw the emotion in her face and nodded, pleased. "It's as I thought."

"What do you know?" she asked, suddenly wary. In answer he reached into his briefcase and pulled out a slim file, pushing it across the desk to her.

"I thought it was you, but I had to see you in person to be sure. Even with the scarring and the haircut, I'd know your face anywhere."

Errol hesitated, then flipped the file open. Inside was a single large photograph. It was of an Eluvian, blue and glowing but not fully opened, and within it stood herself and Morrigan, peering at the camera, Errol's face nervous, Morrigan's curious.

Errol lightly traced the lines of her own face, the familiar yet foreign clothing that she missed so much, the just-visible chain that held Cullen's coin around her neck, now lost forever. She looked at the golden-eyed gaze of the Witch of the Wilds, and wished with all of her will that Morrigan could help her now, that anyone could have the power to help her now.

"It is you, isn't it," he asked, but it wasn't really a question. He just wanted confirmation.

"Yes," Errol said, and the sadness in her voice was real. "Yes, it was me."

He leaned forward, enraptured. " _How?_ " he breathed. "Is it… it's another world? It must be. You were here, I looked you up, I saw the articles, the terrible things that happened to you, and when that photograph was taken— you were in a coma. But that is you." He jabbed his finger at the photograph to emphasize his point. "It shouldn't be possible, but it is. Unless you have an identical twin, you were in two places at once — in a hospital in Seattle, and under the ice in Antarctica, in a chamber no one has set foot in in millions of years. Please, Ms. Kerr, I must know. This is… this is everything."

"If I tell you," Errol said slowly, "what are your plans?"

He sat back. "What do you mean?"

Errol spread her hands across the smooth wood of the desk and let her voice fall into its natural flatness. "Let me be frank, Dr. Kensington. I am not back in this world of my own free will. I am speaking with you today because I need to go there — to what you call the Cavern. To the mirror. It's a portal— if I can find a way to open it. I will tell you anything you want to know, everything about the world beyond the mirror. I can make all of your research worth it. I will do anything you ask of me, but in return you need to find a way to get me there, and soon." She looked him in the eyes. "Can you do that?"

He exhaled slowly, thinking, then nodded. "We're planning an expedition," he said. "I can get you on it, fake your paperwork. Say you're a specialist, or… something. I'll have to think, get it right. But it won't be soon. It's winter there, no one's getting on or off that base until September at the earliest."

"September!" True shock colored Errol's voice. It was only June. "No, that's too long, who knows how much time could have passed. Time moves differently there, it could be _years_ , _decades_."

"I'm sorry," he said, sounding genuinely upset, "but we can't fly in with Antarctic storms." He glanced at her cane. "And it looks like you're still too weak for the trip as it is." When she was silent, he asked: "How long were you there for?"

"Three years, give or take," she said dully.

"And how long passed here?"

"Three to six days," she said.

He started drumming his fingers on the desk again. "Time passing differently," he mused. "Perhaps it's not always faster. Either way, we have no choice." He pulled his laptop back in front of him, his hands poised over the keys. "Start from the beginning."

"You're really going to believe this?" she asked skeptically. He narrowed his eyes at her over the top of his glasses.

"I am a scientist, Ms. Kerr, and I believe what I see. Do not think me so boxed in that I will disregard what is in front of my very eyes. I have seen things that are miraculous, that defy explanation, and I have spent my life attempting to put order to the universe. What happened to you is just one more occurrence in a long line of strange events. Hopefully, it is the one I have been waiting for."

"What do you mean by that?"

He raised his eyebrows. "Do you think you're the only one interested in leaving this planet?" he asked. When she merely stared at him, he turned back to his laptop. "Now, speak. Leave nothing out, and when you are done we will formulate a plan. I will get you on the expedition, Ms. Kerr, and we will see your mirror, I promise you this."

"Eluvian," she said. "It's called an Eluvian."

"Eluvian," he said, testing out the word, and smiled. "Excellent. We're making progress already."

 


	5. Birds Fly South

 

 

"Please don't do this."

Jules' hand was warm on her arm; she was staring straight out of the car window, her shoulders tense, eyes fixed on the huge building in front of them.

Errol looked over, surprised at her friend's words. She had already asked Jules if she wanted to come, and as expected Jules said no. Laughed with something like pain in her voice and asked:

" _What would I do with myself? Tell witty jokes? File paperwork in a feudal legal system? Learn to fight? Clean chamber pots? I love you girl, but I'm not going to be the Sam to your Jon Snow."_

" _But_ _—" Errol had started, and Jules had squeezed her hand._

" _I'm happy here, Errol. Let me be happy. Not everyone is you."_

That had been two months ago. Errol hadn't asked her again, merely focused on completing her physical therapy and spending time with her family. She still lived with her parents, though her father, despite his protestations of love, now avoided her and her dead, blank stare, his gaze darting away a little too fast when it met hers, his excuses to leave the room too thin. He had hugged her, at first, in those early days, but she barely returned the gesture, and now he didn't touch her at all, just moved around her like she was a ghost he had invited into his house, his eyes lingering, pained and aching, on her when he thought she couldn't see.

Her mother acted like everything was normal, like she really believed it was just trauma that would go away with time. Her brother stayed mostly with friends, slipping into the house far too late and stinking of weed, all coiled confusion and the desperate desire to run away from something he couldn't escape.

She came back wrong, and they all knew it.

They would be happier if she left. That was what she told herself, anyway, as she planned. Whether it was the truth was irrelevant. Just like everything else, it was what she needed to believe to keep going.

Her apartment sat empty, a place Errol retreated to when she needed to be alone. She spent her time researching odd things: survival tips, how to bait and track and make gunpowder. She also booked plane tickets, made calls, wrote notes to her family and arranged for what would happen to her possessions.

Her passport was still valid, and she had her own bank account, so her parents only knew about the one plane ticket, to New York to visit Jules, not the second one, the one-way to Argentina. On his end, Dr. Kensington had somehow secured enough falsified documents to give her a convincing doctorate of Prehistoric Anthropology from the University of Chicago and added the name she would go by to an impressive array of published reports.

Now they were sitting in Jules' car in front of the airport, after a weekend of movies and eating too much and smoking and Errol desperately trying to cling to any drop of sensation she could in her last moments with her best friend, and Jules had her hand on her arm and was saying, for the first time: "Please don't do this."

Errol blinked. "Wouldn't a better time to have had this conversation been anytime prior to sitting outside of the airport?"

Jules laughed a little and rubbed her nose with her free hand, and Errol realized that she was crying. "You're right. I've been trying to think of the right way to say it and it never came up. I didn't want to ruin your dream. You've been so different and I wanted to be wrong about this so I didn't say anything but now we're here and…"

She took a deep breath and turned to face Errol, her eyes bright with tears. "Errol, please don't do this. It's not too late. We can drive to my place right now and put this all behind us. You can move to New York. I'll take care of you. You can make it work here, I know you can."

Errol shook her head slowly. "You know how I am, now. Why are you saying this?"

"It's stupid, really," Jules said quickly, as if trying to force the words out before she could think better of it. "I just have this feeling that if you go, terrible things will happen. Something about all of this is very, very wrong. It's like this premonition I can't shake. If you go, Errol, I'm so afraid, I think it's going to be really bad."

Her admission surprised Errol. Jules had never been one for premonitions or belief or anything; for her to say this, she must truly feel something deeper than mere worry. Errol gripped her hand and rested her head against her friend's shoulder, both of them staring out across the parking lot at the airport.

"Jules," she said softly. "I get that this is a shit plan. And you're right, it could go tits up. I don't trust Kensington as far as I could throw him. I don't trust anyone, except you."

"So listen to me," Jules pleaded.

" _But_ ," Errol continued. "You know I can't stay the way I am. Living this half-life is killing me. Even if it's a bad idea, it's better than…" She trailed off. "It _is_ a bad idea. It's stupid and selfish. I should let that world be, my beautiful people who I loved so dearly. I should let them live and not endanger them. This is… reckless. But I can't."

"You can try," Jules whispered. "You have me."

"I'm drowning, Jules," she said. "I don't want to die like this. I at least want to die fighting. I at least want to die as myself, not this… shell." She squeezed her friend's hand. "You know I'm not me."

Jules sighed. "I know."

"I'm not ready to die."

Jules was quiet for a moment. "What will you do if you can't find a way back?" she asked. "What if the mirror doesn't open?"

"I'll come back, and we'll live that life."

Jules pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "You were always a terrible liar."

Errol didn't say anything; she couldn't. Jules was right.

No matter what happened, she wasn't coming back.

"Here," Jules said, pulling away and fumbling in her pockets. "I got you something. In case you make it through and live your magical life." She dropped metal into Errol's cupped palm. "To remember me by."

Errol looked down to see a little jagged silver half-heart on a long chain, the cheap kind from the mall that kids wore in Middle School. She turned it over; on the back it said _Forever_.

Jules pressed her own necklace to it, creating a whole heart. On the back of Jules' it said _Best Friends._

"See, you always wear yours, and I'll always wear mine," Jules said. "And we'll always fit together, even when we're far apart."

"You know this will probably turn our skin green," Errol said.

"So let it turn our skin green," Jules said, taking Errol's necklace and clasping it around her friend's neck before attaching her own. "It's part of the charm." She smiled at Errol through her tears. "Promise me you'll wear it always?"

"I promise."

Jules nodded and scrubbed her eyes with the back of her hand. "I love you, girl. Be safe out there."

Impulsively, Errol leaned over and kissed Jules' forehead. "Love you, sis," she said. There was that pinprick of sadness, enough to make her eyes well up for a moment, the sharp relief of pain. "I will miss you."

"Not as much as I'll miss you." Jules shoved her lightly. "Now go, so I can sit here and cry alone in my car like a loser."

"Bye Julesy." Errol squeezed her arm one last time and got out of the car. She opened the back door, grabbed her pack, and was just walking away when she heard the window roll down behind her.

"Hey!" Errol turned around to see Jules draped over the seats, her head halfway out the passenger-side window. "I'll always believe it. That you made it through and are living an amazing life fighting dragons and having all the sex with your warrior man. In my mind, that's where you'll be, no matter what."

Errol swallowed hard, and the pain was real, fresh and deep and a shock after months of nothing. She blinked back tears. "Thank you," she said, and Jules just nodded and closed the window before settling herself back in the driver's seat and resting her forehead on the steering wheel.

Errol watched her for a minute, and when she didn't move, Errol turned and walked toward the airport, and didn't look back.

* * *

Kensington met her at Ezeiza International Airport, Argentina, where they flew together to Malvinas Argentinas Airport in Ushuaia, the southernmost airport in the world. From there they took a large black car out of the city to a military base, bumping over dirt roads in the starless night.

He used the time to go over the details with her again, even though they had Skyped multiple times over the past months. She had initially been surprised to learn that he was the only one who knew about the photograph. He had been monitoring the cameras alone when the mirror had done its trick, and once it closed again he had gone into the server and removed those precious few moments from the feed, looping them with previous minutes so no one would notice. When asked why, he said that certain discoveries were too precious to be shared with an entire team, where it would take only one person to slip and show it to the world, robbing him of his discovery and sending a mob of media, government, and scientists to his site. He wanted to get there first, to set foot in the Chamber and find what he would find, before sharing the truth of it, and of her, with a few select members of his core group.

She was Dr. Katie Kerr, hair permanently tucked under a winter cap and name changed in case anyone recognized her from the extraordinary case of Errol Kerr that was in the media nearly four months ago. She was not to talk too much to anyone and to be as standoffish as possible _—_ something Errol, with her lack of emotions, would find all too easy to do. She had explained her situation and dropped the facade for Kensington almost immediately after meeting him. He made it clear that her flat intonation unnerved him, but he didn't ask her to stop, and that made her life easier.

Still, the further South they went, the more she felt. It was like a box inside of her was slowly opening, light trickling out in tiny spoonfuls, a bit of something but never _enough._ By the time they reached the base, she almost felt, and it was unnerving, just there but out of reach.

It was a small team, only six people, and for some reason they were drinking in the hanger, knees knocking together in the cold, laughing. The laughter died down when Kensington appeared, and introductions were stiff. Errol shook each of their hands and tried to remember their names, and didn't object when Kensington pressed a phone into her hand and told her to go outside and make her call.

"There'll be enough time to get to know one another over the next few days," he said with a pained smile.

She took the phone without a word and left the hanger, the buzz of conversation low behind her as he began to speak with the team.

Once outside, Errol took a long, deep breath and let it out in a puff of white. Emotion was close here, the lights above her green fire, the pinpricks in her heart like someone had been cutting holes.

She dialed the long string of numbers with shaking hands, then held the phone up to her ear as it took far too long to connect. Around her, the night was cold and brisk, the only sounds those wafting out of the hanger behind her. She shivered, the air cutting, and the phone began to ring.

Maybe he wouldn't pick up.

Three, four, five rings. Six. Maybe it would be better if it went to voicemail. Maybe he was out to dinner, or taking Tiny for a walk. It might be easier that way. More selfish, but easier.

As if anything she could do now would be more selfish.

"Hello, this is Broehain."

Errol's breath caught in her throat, and there was only staticky silence.

"Hello? Is anyone there?"

Finally she spoke. "Hi, Daddy."

"Errol? What… what kind of number is this? It's coming up—" She knew he was looking down at his phone— " _Argentina?_ Where are you?"

She rubbed her nose. "You just answered your own question. I'm at the southern tip of Argentina, just about as far south as you can go before you hit the ocean. It's beautiful here. I wish… I wish you could see it."

"Why are you there? Errol, what's going on? I thought you were in New York with Jules?" His voice was frantic now, like he could sense what was happening.

"Please don't be angry at Jules, she's angry enough at herself already. She begged me not to come. Really begged. This isn't her fault."

"Errol, _what's going on_?"

"I'm going back."

There was stunned, empty, hollow silence at the other end of the line. Then a breath, " _No_ ," that became harder: "NO."

"Daddy—"

"It's not possible, it's not POSSIBLE, Errol, you're here, you're home, there is no going back to that place, you've been tricked, lied to, you need to come home _now_."

"I can't, I'm so sorry, I love you but I have to do this."

"Why? We love you, you have a family, a life here, a home—"

"I know, and I love you so so much, please don't think it's because of you. But I don't belong here anymore. I don't."

"I did so much," his voice said desperately over the phone, and she could tell he was weeping. "So much to bring you back. You can't just leave after everything—"

"I never asked you to!" she shouted, suddenly angry, the emotion stabbing at the edge of her near-numb consciousness. "I never asked you to bring me back! I told you I was happy! I told you to let me go! I had love, I had purpose! Why did you have to bring me back? Why couldn't you have just let me stay?"

"HE KILLED YOU!" Broehain screamed back. "He killed you in front of me and you were dead!"

"You knew there was magic! You knew and I told you and you _knew_!"

"I wasn't just going to let my daughter die in front of me, not when I could do something about it!"

"I'm not Anna! It wouldn't have been your fault!"

His breath grew short. "You think that's why I saved you? You think I needed a reason to save my own daughter?"

Errol curled into herself and fell to her knees. Dimly she was aware of the water on her face. "I'm sorry, Daddy, I'm so sorry, and I love you, but you should never have brought me back. I'm— I'm needed there—"

"You're needed _here_."

"Not like I am there. I can't breathe here, I can't feel, I'm cut off, I'm— I have to do this. Please, tell Mom and John that I love them, tell them this isn't their fault, tell them I'm happy."

"Errol, please, come home, or just wait one day and I'll come to you."

"I have to go now."

"Please stay on the line, baby girl, please, Errol—"

"I have to go now. I love you, Dad. Please… forgive me." She hung up the phone and stared down at it clenched in her trembling hand, the left one with the useless scar across it. "Maker forgive me."

She felt a hand fall on her shoulder and looked up to see Dr. Kensington regarding her with sympathetic eyes. "Are you all right?"

She nodded and let him help her to her feet. "I'll be okay," she said, handing the phone back.

"Not having second thoughts?"

She shook her head fiercely. "No. I have to do this."

"Good," he said, giving her his handkerchief. "We'll stay out here for a few minutes until you're presentable. Then you should get some rest. We leave before dawn. Ever ridden in one of those?" He pointed to a big, lumbering military plane that looked like a sleeping giant in the darkness. Errol shook her head and he smiled.

"It'll be a ride to remember." He squeezed her shoulder reassuringly. "It will all work out, Errol. We should reach the mirror within three days."

"Eluvian," she said, wiping her face and holding the red handkerchief like a talisman. His eyes lit up.

"Indeed it is."

 


	6. The Chamber

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _So, um, just remember that I love you, okay?_

 

 

 

Errol lowered herself on the rope, the movements jerky. "Steady!" she heard Cynthia call from below her. "We don't want to jiggle anything."

After a few long minutes her feet touched slick ice and Cynthia's hand pressed into her back. It was a small team for this first expedition, just the three of them, a bare group taking its first wobbly steps into the past.

"Welcome to the Cavern," Cynthia said, her face shining in the soft blue lights they had stacked around the room. Dr. Cynthia Barnes was Kensington's second-in-command; she'd worked with him from the project's inception and had a list of publications longer than the years Errol had been alive. "You're the third person living to have seen this room with their own eyes."

"Fourth," Errol murmured as she unhooked her harness and stepped aside. Above her, Dr. Kensington started his descent. Cynthia cocked her head.

"Excuse me?"

"Nothing," Errol said, her eyes already on the mirror. She held up her lantern and approached it eagerly. It was unbroken, that was good, and red flowers grew at the base. The stone animals at its sides were worn and broken, but…

"See anything interesting?" Dr. Kensington asked from behind her.

Errol hunched down, then stretched onto her stomach to inspect the bottom of one statue carefully. "Paws," she said, her heart sinking. "Shit. I was hoping it would be a deer or something."

"Paws mean what?" asked Cynthia.

"Wolves," Errol said tersely. She stood and dusted ice off of her snowsuit, then peered closely at the mirror. It was tarnished, but there was an arching design across the top, and the frame was a tangle of leaves and trees. Errol suddenly broke into a smile, her fingers hovering over the pattern.

"Wait, I know this! These are Mythal's symbols!"

Dr. Kensington approached her. "So what do the statues mean?"

"It's ancient, like at her temple. Guardians. From when they were friends. This isn't Fen'Harel's Eluvian, it's Mythal's!" She laughed in relief. "Oh, thank the Maker! This is something I can work with!"

"What exact kind of anthropology did you study?" Cynthia asked suspiciously. "This is no culture I've ever heard of. These date back to before known human civilization."

"I told you, Dr. Barnes, Dr. Kerr has a very specialized field of study," Dr. Kensington said in a stern tone was meant to brook no argument. "What she has to say is very valuable."

"What she's saying she has no possible way of knowing," Cynthia argued. "Albert, I know there are things here you're not telling me—"

"And if I'm not telling you then I have very good reason."

"—but they're hampering my ability to do my job."

"Dr. Barnes," Dr. Kensington said witheringly. "You were brought here for one purpose and right now I do not care about your feelings. Listen and you might learn something."

Cynthia's face went red and her mouth snapped shut. Errol was too absorbed in her study of the mirror to listen to the drama behind her.

It was Mythal's mirror. Did Morrigan know that when she showed it to her? How could she not, with the Well in her head? Is that _why_ she showed it to her? Morrigan was bound to Mythal, after all. Perhaps Mythal was the one who wanted Errol to know and was working through Morrigan. Which meant…

Maybe Mythal had the key, back in Thedas. There wasn't a key here, nothing but flowers and ice and crumbling statues. Keys were things like focis and Wells and magic.

Errol removed the three layers of gloves from her left hand and touched the mirror lightly with her fingertips, ignoring Cynthia's gasp of indignation behind her. She couldn't believe she was touching it from this side. She was so close. So close to Ferelden and Skyhold and the Fade and _Cullen_. So close to everything she loved and wanted. Her friends, her life, magic, hope, purpose.

The mirror felt warm to the touch. Errol made a decision.

"I'm going to try and summon Mythal."

Dr. Kensington sounded inordinately excited. "Do you think you can do that?"

"I don't know. I don't know if there's enough magic here. But Morrigan showed me this Eluvian for a reason. And you saw the photo for a reason. I must be here for a _reason_. I've met Mythal, and this is hers. She might hear me. She might let me through. There isn't a key here. This is the only way."

"How will you do it?"

Errol shrugged. "Who knows? But let's try. Maybe you should… stand back, just in case."

"Have you two gone completely mad?" Cynthia asked. "I thought you were professionals completing an expedition, but now I'm starting to think you're part of some cult! Summoning an ancient goddess? Really? You have a lot to answer for."

Dr. Kensington marched to Cynthia and pulled her back. "Shut your mouth or I will duct tape it shut," he snarled, in a voice that scared even Errol. Cythia's eyes widened. "Be. Quiet."

Cynthia complied. Errol took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She tried to feel something, anything, beyond the pressing numbness that the lack of Fade left in its wake, this half-Tranquil existence that made every breath a struggle, like she was half-an-inch from giving up and slipping peacefully underwater.

But here, with the Southern Lights flaring above her and the Eluvian so close, she emerged from the water for the first time in six months. She breathed deeply and felt emotion fizzle back into her consciousness.

_Oh, it felt so good to feel again, even just a little._

For one brief, shining moment, she was almost Errol Kerr again.

Errol pressed her palm to the glass. It wasn't much, but when her scar made contact it… tingled. Just a little, like the faintest pins and needles, almost impossible to detect.

She knelt, a petitioner at an altar. "Mythal," she said softly, then louder. "Mythal. Flemeth. If you can hear me, please, I beseech you, help me. I am weakened, but you know me, the Inquisitor, the Herald of Andraste, the Otherworlder, once a Spirit. I defeated Corypheus and brought peace to Thedas. Please, come to me in my time of need. I was torn from your world as surely as you were torn from your body when you were murdered — in our own ways, we were both murdered, and both lived on. Please, Mythal, open your Eluvian one last time. Let me pass through. Let me go home."

Silence. She could hear Cynthia shifting irritably behind her. Errol pressed her palm harder on the glass. "Please, Mythal, Flemeth… Morrigan! Anyone! I need a key to cross through! _Please_. I will do anything. Please." A tear made its way down her face, nearly freezing in the frigid underground air. She leaned her forehead against the glass and closed her eyes. "Help me," she whispered. "Don't leave me here."

"She's completely out of her mind," Cynthia breathed, and for a terrible moment, Errol believed her.

She didn't see the tendrils of smoke curling out from the mirror, or hear Dr. Kensington's amazed gasp.

"I always wondered what it would take to make you kneel. I've now learned it takes the ends of the Earth, the bottom of the world, beneath a frozen sea. Indomitable, indeed."

Errol's insides froze. She looked up at him, and he _smiled_.

"Rise, Inquisitor. One such as yourself should not be on your knees."

Errol scrambled backwards, her hands slamming into the cold ground. "You," she breathed. "No, this is all wrong, it's supposed to be Mythal."

Fen'Harel cocked his head. "And so it is. Or have you forgotten how to _feel_ in these deadened months?"

He lifted his arm, and Errol found herself jerked to her feet. Her hand flared green, and then she finally understood what had felt wrong about him all of those months ago.

"You… you killed her?" she gasped. "You took her power? You and Mythal are now…"

"One, in a way," he said. "Suffice to say this Eluvian is now mine, and I decide who crosses its threshold. And I did nothing that she did not allow me to do. We had an agreement, of sorts." He blinked at her lazily. "Think of me what you will, I am no kin-slayer, especially of Mythal."

Behind her, Cynthia made a strangled noise, and Fen'Harel's attention flickered briefly to the two scientists. "You do always keep interesting company," he said, and Errol felt his barrier flow through the mirror without even a hint of effort from him, effectively blocking their noise. "But I would prefer we speak in private."

The mirror wasn't fully opened; he stood as if through a pane of water, looking at her with her hand still stretched out and glowing with his magic. "What would you have of me, Errol?" he asked, his voice softer. "You did, after all, call me here."

"I didn't… I didn't mean to call _you_ ," she said harshly. He sighed.

"But you did, and believe me when I say that I am the only one who will come. Or do you wish me to deactivate this Eluvian forever? You can go home to your family, to your pitiful half-life. Tell me, how has it been, hovering on the edge of Tranquility? I imagine it must be akin to torture." She didn't answer, just breathed heavily through her nose. He raised his eyebrows. "You're _enjoying_ this, because you can feel again. Even the hurt and anger."

She trembled at the rush of emotion flooding her previously deadened brain. "Don't go," she said, hating how weak she sounded. "I have to go back. I will die here."

"Really?" he asked idly. "How?"

"The snow," she said without hesitation. She had thought it through. It would be peaceful. She remembered the feeling from Haven. "I'll just go outside and fall asleep." She put her glowing hand up to the wavering mirror. "Let me through."

"So," he said softly. "It comes to this."

Errol glared at him, her heart thundering in her ears. _So close._ "Let me through."

"What will you give me in return?"

Her palm flared with magic and pain, wonderful pain, a taunt, everything she could have dangling tantalizingly just out of reach. Errol stifled a groan, her nerves on fire. She could feel again, like plunging into warm water after being frozen and it _burned_. To feel like this, to be alive — everything else was drowned out in this rush of emotion and magic pulsing through her like a second heart. She would fall to his feet to keep it; in that moment, she would do, she would do—

"Anything," she said, and meant it.

She'd come too far to go back now.

"Anything is a very big word," he said, his voice low. "There was a time I would have given you anything."

"I know." She met his eyes unflinchingly. "I don't regret what I did."

He sighed. "You will."

She shuddered and closed her eyes, trying to think straight through the sparks of deadened nerves flaring to life under her skin, inside of her brain. Her blood sounded too loud, roaring like a river in her veins. Oh, to _feel._ "What do you want?"

"What I have always wanted," he said simply. "Peace. The restoration of my people. You."

Errol opened her eyes and glowered at him. The answer wasn't surprising but it still made her angry. "I thought you abhorred slavery. Quoting verbatim, here."

He seemed mildly insulted. "This is not slavery. This is two people entering into a contract willingly."

"One person and one God."

Something sad flickered across his face. "Semantics, and also a misunderstanding which I have deliberately fostered. But now is not the time."

Something else crossed her mind, and the thought chilled her enough that she jerked her hand back, letting some of the precious emotion seep away. Her head cleared slightly and her mouth twisted into a snarl. "Did you send me back to Earth?"

"If I did, why would I be here, offering you a way to return? I never wanted you to leave our realm, Errol. I believe I made that perfectly clear the last time we spoke."

"Answer the question, _Wolf_."

He met her gaze evenly. "No, I did not. That was on your father, I believe, and a healer unusually enhanced by a lifetime spent saturated under the Lights."

"How do you know that?"

"I know many things. And I will be honest, I have… interfered to bring you here. But I have answered your question. You have yet to answer mine."

She licked her cracked lips. "Interfered?"

"I wanted you back. I made sure it happened. I've told you before I will not reveal all my secrets to you. Not yet."

"But you didn't send me to Earth."

He huffed, a thread of irritation winding its way through his calm voice. "I tire of your games. I've answered already. Should I leave you here, then? Are we finished?" He stepped back, as if to close the mirror.

"No!" she exclaimed, surging forward. "I just… I had to make sure."

"To what end?"

"I had to know this wasn't part of some grand scheme."

He shook his head as if chastising her. "Sending you away from me with the barest slip of a chance you could ever return? It would have been easier to manipulate you from our world had I wanted. I am not as convoluted as you may think."

"I don't know," she said, and almost cracked a grin. "You can be pretty convoluted."

He frowned and shifted on his bare feet. "You stand here being pithy. You must be cold, under the ice."

She shrugged and stretched, letting the emotion fill her again, pour into her cracks and seal them back up, until she was overflowing. "It feels good."

"I understand." His eyes softened. "This… contract. It is not slavery. You would not be compelled to do anything you did not wish. Not fight. Not harm your friends, nor give away secrets. Nothing."

She raised an eyebrow. "But…"

His eyes held hers. "Your loyalty would be to me. No running, no struggling against it, against me. You would not be who you were. That life would be gone and you would have to accept that. We would be equal and bound, the two of us, as it should have been. I will give you Thedas, if you will give me—"

"Myself?"

"Your loyalty."

"Riiight." She dragged the word out disbelievingly. He merely shook his head, like she was a child throwing a tantrum.

"Pithy again."

"Maybe I enjoy my last moments of freedom."

"I am not made of patience, Errol."

Errol twisted her hand and felt the magic crackle and thaw the ice in her veins. Something inside was screaming at her to stop this, howling that she was making a huge mistake, but then she thought of her empty apartment and the tortuous months of emotionless nothing and the cold of falling asleep in the snow outside and _she didn't want to die._

For the first time since she was torn away from Thedas, she wanted to live. She wanted to live so badly she would crack open her own ribs and massage her heart back to life.

"I will agree to this," she said, and she almost didn't recognize her voice, feral and drunk with emotion. "But I have a condition. If I find out that you had anything to do with sending me back to Earth—"

" _I didn't."_

She ignored him. "These months have been hell. It's— it's something I can't forgive. If that's a lie, the contract is void, and I am free."

"Freedom implies slavery," he said, and she threw back her head and laughed like it was crying, or maybe it was the same thing.

"You know I wouldn't be doing this if I had any other choice."

He watched her carefully, and seemed resigned somehow, his shoulders minutely slumped. "Yes, I know."

"Do you agree?"

"I do. Do you?" She didn't speak, just stretched onto her tiptoes and stared at the green glow from her palm bouncing off the smooth ice above, her personal Southern Lights. "Errol, do you agree?"

She let out a rush of a sigh and thought of Cullen, golden-haired and golden-hearted, waiting for her. She would see him again. Even glimpses, even though he would hate her, even though it would bring nothing but pain and she was so selfish she could barely stand it but she _loved_ him, she remembered the feeling now and it was _everything_ and—

She would see him again, and damn the consequences. "I do."

Fen'Harel nodded once, sharply. "I am glad. And… forgive me."

Errol barely had time to realize that the barrier was down before Dr. Kensington was next to her, Cynthia's wrist firmly in his grip. The mirror opened with a rush of magic, flooding Errol's senses until her nerve-endings screamed, sensation to the point of pain. Spots danced in front of her eyes, her brain bursting out chemicals like fireworks, and she was so overwhelmed that at first she didn't register the splash of warm blood on her face.

Fen'Harel was just looking at her sadly. "I told you I interfered. He was so eager to leave his world behind."

She looked over, head still buzzing like a jar of lightning, and saw Kensington cradling Cynthia's body, his hands sticky with the blood that gurgled up from the curved slice across her neck. The woman hadn't even had time to scream. Before Errol could do more than stare dumbly at the scene before her the blood rose, spiraling up, directed by Solas' long fingers, and all she could think was, _I thought you said you didn't practice blood magic._

She tried to move but she was bound, her breath caught in her lungs, as the sacrifice called forth something hazy and green in the air. A tear, just to the right of the mirror, a jagged rip through realities. Errol's consciousness was wrenched toward it as pain racked her body, and she knew what was happening because it had happened before.

 _I should have known,_ she thought, right before it all faded to black. _I should have known he'd never take me back as a human._

Her soul tore from her body and vanished into the Breach, which snapped closed like hungry jaws the moment she was gone. The husk of her, still alive but barely, collapsed. Kensington picked her up, his exposed red-soaked hands and snowsuit smearing her body with rapidly cooling blood.

Solas regarded him coolly. "A deal is a deal," he said, stepping aside. Kensington passed through the mirror and it sealed behind them, leaving Cynthia's corpse on the cold ground.

Solas brushed his fingers across Errol's bloody forehead. "I must find her spirit immediately. You are in a safe place. Guard her body until I return. I will be mere moments."

"She won't last long like this," Kensington warned, only to balk when Solas fixed his ice-blue eyes on him.

"This is a place of magic. She'll last long enough. I will be quick, and then we'll see to her shell's more… permanent arrangements. Stay. Here." He turned, then said without looking back, "I hardly need tell you that should anything befall her I will have no more use of you."

Then he was gone, and Kensington was alone in the misty Crossroads, soaked in blood, Errol's empty body in his arms.

 


	7. Meanwhile, in Thedas...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Happy Thanksgiving US readers! Here is your gift. So sorry for the long delay, it's been a rough month and I'm supposed to be working on my novel, but there hasn't been much writing of any kind going on. I'm still chugging along though, and ready for the holidays. Cheers!_

 

 

 

"I thought I might find you here."

Cullen didn't turn at the sound of Cassandra's voice, merely pressed his palms more firmly into Skyhold's battlements. "Inquisitor," he said curtly.

To his displeasure she joined him, and they both stared out into the night, at the scar in the sky, clear and visible from this topmost tower. Behind them, far below, the sounds of celebration drifted up on an icy wind.

"I'm sure you know that Varric has spies staking out your office," she said. "He's insistent on getting you drunk tonight."

Cullen snorted. "Why do you think I'm up here?"

She gave him a sidelong look. "And don't call me Inquisitor. It's bad enough the dwarf still calls me Seeker. I have enough titles to last a lifetime."

He nodded. "Of course," he said softly.

For a while they stood in silence, staring at the strangely beautiful scar dance across the sky. Finally she sighed and turned her back on the sight, leaning against the parapet.

"One year," she said, her gaze now on the courtyard far below them, where the celebration was in full swing. "One year since Corypheus fell and the Breach was sealed, and here we stand." She was quiet again for a moment. "I did not think it would be like this."

Cullen's shoulder's tensed. He knew what she was picturing, as she looked down at the dancing bodies — Errol dancing with them, her hair down and glittering in the firelight, smile huge, her hand sparking green as she thrust it upward in victory. Instead there was only a statue of her that they danced around, and the stories they still told. "Neither did I."

"Cullen, if you want to talk—"

"I don't."

She nodded. "Then I will just stand here," she said solemnly, and turned around again, so they were shoulder-to-shoulder, staring back at what was once the Breach.

Her steady presence was comforting. Cullen knew Cassandra wanted to help, but there was so much she still didn't know, so much he wouldn't, couldn't tell her. It had been nine months since Errol had 'officially' disappeared, five months since she had actually vanished from this world, torn from it screaming, pleading, begging not to go. It was something that only he, Varric, Dorian, and Cole knew about.

And Solas. Cullen closed his eyes, reigning in his emotions at the thought of _that name._

As if reading his mind, Cassandra said: "Zevran has informed us that the dreams have returned. Sera confirms it, however unwillingly. We should convene in the War Room tomorrow to discuss our next move."

He nodded. "Yes. In the afternoon. Most of Skyhold will be sleeping off the celebrations. Let them enjoy themselves while they still can."

"You truly believe a war is coming?"

"How can you not? With what Solas is doing—" He shook his head. "No, with what _Fen'Harel_ is doing, he is all but declaring war."

Cassandra sighed again, deeply, a troubled sound. "Perhaps you are right. And we must stop him. With no Mark or magic, without—" She stopped herself abruptly. "We can discuss this tomorrow. Tonight is a celebration for the Inquisition and all of Thedas." She placed her hand lightly on Cullen's shoulder. "I have said it before, but I am sorry, my friend."

Then she was gone, slipping quietly back down into the keep.

Cullen stayed on the battlements for a long time.

* * *

"The temple in the Frostbacks was a ruin," Cullen said, planting a marker firmly over it. "The snow destroyed the tunnels underneath, not just burying but actively crushing everything below it. There were signs that someone had been there before us, but nothing could have been salvaged from such a place."

"Another dead end, then," Josephine said, studying the map. "That's three unviable temples already."

"Three Solas has already beaten us to," Cullen said, curling his hand into a fist on top of the table. "Three we only believe were unviable. Perhaps he destroyed them after he left."

Cassandra's voice was calming. "You were with us, Cullen," she said. "You saw as we did the work of thousands of years of swamp and forest growth. Those temples were not destroyed in a day. He has found nothing of use."

"According to the lovely Morrigan, we should still have four temples left within Ferelden and Orlais before we must head into the Anderfels and beyond," Zevran said, his fingers skimming across the golden markers. "Though we have no idea which he's headed to next." His glanced up to the ceiling. "Any thoughts, cariño?"

Sera scowled from her perch on the beams. "I told you, it's not like I'm being given a bloody map! They're just dreams! Every other friggin' elf's got 'em, 'cept the ones with the vallisi-facey-paint, and you're gettin' 'em too. Don't see why I have to be holed up in here with you."

Cullen rubbed his temples. They had this argument every time. "Because we need to make sure that both of your dreams coincide, that all elves are receiving the same message," he said, yet again. "And you two are the only ones we know for a fact won't join his side."

"Damn right I won't," she said, still scowling. "Stupid arseface can take his dreams and shove 'em where the sun don't shine." She rolled her eyes into the back of her head and drawled out a terrible Solas impression. "Ohhh, I'm a God, I can restore Arlathan, I can lift you out of slavery, I can restore the days of elfy elf bullshit, just build me altars and follow me off this fuckin' cliff like good little sheep." She waggled her fingers and returned her eyes to normal. "I can't believe he's doing this. What an arsehole." She crossed her arms and muttered the next line so quietly Cullen almost didn't hear it. "I wish Errol were here. She'd put him in his place."

Cullen looked down, the pang in his chest fresh and deep. Ever since Morrigan had pointed the elven ruins out on the map he had pursued them like a man possessed, unable to simply sit in Skyhold and let the teams go out without him. Now that Errol was truly gone, all he had were her last, portentous warnings about Solas, the ones that coincided with Morrigan's, of elven orbs and ruins and a new world waiting to awaken, and now all barefaced elves were having dreams urging them to rise up and follow him. He was what she had been hunting when she had been wrenched away, and he would see this through, sleeping as little as possible in those dead, empty spaces she had carved out for him in the Fade.

"It makes sense," Zevran was saying, "that he would not send his dreams to the Dalish. From what I've read about this Solas, not only did he have a marked contempt for them, but they still cling fiercely to their beliefs of Fen'Harel as a betrayer, and they have their freedom, if one can call it that. City elves, on the other hand, have mostly forgotten their stories, and are either slaves or living in Alienages, and would be amenable to anyone who would offer them power." At Cullen's surprised look he smiled sharply. "What, do you think I became the new Spymaster because of my pretty face? My mother was Dalish, you know. I know of their beliefs. I never believed them myself… until now."

"And now? What do you believe?" Cassandra asked sharply.

He laughed. "Oh, don't worry about my changing sides. If that elf is what one considers a God, I'll stick with my personal belief that heaven is wine and women. Sometimes men." He winked at Cullen. "But these dreams are bothersome. I do wish for a good night's sleep, and of course for Thedas not to be thrown into chaos yet again. It has been quite the decade, no?" He tapped his finger to his chin and glanced at Josephine. "Shall we go over what we discussed, my dearest Ambassador?"

"Oh, yes," Josephine said, and her cheeks turned pink as she shuffled her paperwork. She still seemed a little flustered by Zevran after all of these months, an innocent despite her keen analytical mind, and he delighted in teasing her. "Quieting the elves should be first on our agenda. Luckily for us, we have both a sympathetic Divine and an Empress of Orlais with a very," she coughed lightly, " _personal_ interest in their cause."

"Your previous Inquisitor did get the job done," Zevran said lightly, and Cullen felt that twist in his stomach again, like a wound that wouldn't close. He tried to remind himself that she was likely home, with her family, alive and breathing, not dead, just not here with him, and that should be enough.

It wasn't, would never be enough, but it would have to do.

Slowly he unclenched his fist and laid it flat on the table, not realizing it had been clenched this whole time. "We will leave that to your care," he said, addressing both Zevran and Josephine. "But we must pick which temple to investigate next. I should like to ride out as soon as possible."

Cassandra again had her hand on his arm. "Cullen, are you sure—"

"You're under no obligation to join me, Inquisitor," he said, stepping away. "I know your responsibilities are many, and that you are still attempting to rebuild the Seekers. I have Iron Bull and the Chargers, perhaps Dorian, and Varric is always willing, Maker only knows why. Besides, it's time I personally checked on some of the wards and barriers around the active rifts and replaced the guards with contingents of fresh soldiers. I will be—"

His next words were cut off by green light and a blast strong enough that it shattered the windows. Instinctively Cullen shielded his face and ducked under the table, curling his body protectively around Sera's when she dropped from the ceiling and scuttled in front of him. There was a roar, the sound like a hurricane or a thousand dragons, and Cullen chanced to look up, saw the swirling, familiar whirlpool of the Breach over the ruins of the Temple of Sacred Ashes, and then—

Nothing. The Breach blinked out of existence as quickly as it had appeared, leaving them all staggered in the silence of its passing, the glass that littered the table and floor the only sign it had happened at all.

"Holy Maker," Cassandra breathed, staring out over the valley. "What— was that the Breach?"

"Couldn'ta been, right?" Sera said, giggling nervously. "Breaches don't just appear and disappear. Had to have been… something else. It's gone now, anyway."

Cullen stood and spun on his heel. "Inquisitor, I'm heading out now with a full squad to investigate. Are you with me?"

"Of course, Commander," Cassandra said. "If this is another Breach…" She let the words hang unsaid as they hurriedly left the War Room. Cullen's mind filled in the blanks.

_If it is, without the Mark, without Errol, we're doomed._

Everyone wanted to go, of course, crowding around them like a tumble of fierce puppies, all with cries of "What the hell was that?" and "Well _that_ was deeply unsettling," and "It had to be _demons_!" so that by the time they rode out nearly all that was left of the Inner Circle rode with them: Cassandra, Varric, Iron Bull, the Chargers, Sera, Dorian, and a large number of troops.

When they finally reached the Temple, there was nothing there. Dorian said the veil was thin, and it felt like it had after the Breach had just been closed, but the sky was calm and there was nothing and no one among the ruins. Just silence, snow, and the thin, tanging scent of blood.

 

 


	8. Awakenings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here there be Trespasser spoilers, if anyone still hasn’t played it. It can also be assumed that any information from Trespasser not relayed specifically in these chapters is relayed off-screen. 
> 
> Also, the emotional notations won’t last past this chapter, it’s just a literary conceit I felt like playing with.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A million apologies, my loves. It’s been too long.
> 
> Long, long story short, it’s been a rough couple of months – I was diagnosed with Lyme’s disease and have now completed treatment, but it still left me with all kinds of fun going away presents. In the good news category we bought a house! Now I’m officially in the suburbs with a yard and everything. It’s been a weird time.
> 
> To all who have stuck around, thank you. After such a long wait, you get this chapter of… pretty much all dialogue! Watch as our intrepid leads talk to each other!

 

**Awakenings**

 

 

When Errol awoke, it was to singing.

Not actual singing, of course, but it was as if the universe was packed tight in her veins and thrumming its song, a wild, coursing verse that nearly lifted her off of the bed with the force of it. Her heart, which technically didn’t need to beat, fluttered like a hummingbird’s, and magic rippled outward from her body in a green arc, her hand alight with it.

“Hush, now.”

Something touched her left palm. The magic siphoned off, and some of the singing dampened enough that she could open her eyes and breathe.

“There.”

The ceiling was white and glossy, like Mother of Pearl, and curved like the inside of an egg. The air was a golden latticework of sun and shadow; it smelled of green forest, and sounded of leaves rustling together in a gentle breeze. Errol blinked hazily. She felt light, and long, her bones shifted, her center of gravity higher. She didn’t have to touch her ears to know that they had points.

She wiggled her bare toes experimentally, then her fingers. Finally, she sat up.

The room had no fourth wall; instead, it overlooked a forest that seemed to stretch forever. Everything inside was pearlescent and curved, everything outside earth and emerald.

“This is a safe place.”

Solas – no, Fen'Harel – stood there in his old clothes, a book in his hand, like nothing had changed. Emotion slammed into her like a punch to the gut, crippling in its intensity. Her hands fisted the white sheets. ( _Anger: hot, parched.)_ “You killed me.”

“I did not.”

She looked down at her body, at the long legs clad in soft leggings and foot wraps, like him. She was more stable than she had been before, when the thread stretched thin between worlds to her dying body. She felt real, even though she knew she was not.

Understanding dawned. “Where am I?”

He put the book away carefully and turned to her. “I told you: In a safe place.”

“I mean, where is my _body_?”

“The answer is the same.”

She let out an aggravated grunt. ( _Irritation: the creaking squeal of nails down a chalkboard.)_ “Don’t play games.”

“If that is what you truly wish.” He held out his hand. Not really feeling like she had a choice ( _Hopelessness: a pit, a stone)_ , Errol placed her fingers in his, and he helped her off the bed. “Come and see.”

Her head spun. Sensation drowned her. The cool floor under her feet evoked a rush of pleasure _(Joy: clear water and fireflies)_ , the hand in hers a surge of distrust _(Suspicion: the sun-warmed belly of a snake)_ , the forest they approached a wave of giddy delight _(Hope: ephemeral, the breeze leading out of a cave)_. Everything felt, and everything hurt.

They stepped onto a balcony in the warm green air. From here Errol could see that the room was part of a larger complex built in massive trees and connected by bridges and winding stairs. Below, the forest floor teamed with elves, all without vallaslin; they were trading, working, eating, smiling. Many pulled branches from the forest while others carved them into arrows, and smiths worked ironbark into armor.

“Where are we?” she asked, studying the scene intently.

He curled his hands around the balustrade. “A forest. That is all you need to know for now. It’s a safe haven for my people. Our people.”

“They’re preparing for war.”

“Does that come as a surprise to you?”

Errol squinted. “There are altars.” The red flowers looked familiar. She looked at him with wide eyes. “Are they _praying_ to you?” _(Surprise: pins and needles of a limb reawakening.)_

He seemed mildly uncomfortable. “They no longer praying to Andraste.”

“So…”

“They are…” He exhaled slowly. “Praying to what they think I am.”

She crossed her arms. “Explain.”

“I needed to get them here, so I sent them dreams. I still do, and more come daily. The Dalish are too fearful of the name Fen’Harel, but those in the cities, who have lost so much… I guide them here, where they can be safe.”

“To build an army.”

He inclined his head. “Yes, that too. They are eager to fight. Too long they have been trod under heel. They wish to restore the world to what it once was.”

“You mean Elvhenan? That’s not even possible, unless…” Errol blinked, and looked at the mark on her palm, the Anchor from his orb. She blinked again. _(Understanding: squinting in too-bright light.)_ Then: “You’re talking about tearing down the veil, aren’t you?”

He looked strangely sad. “It must be done, to restore what was lost.”

“And what will happen to this world?”

“It will burn, and the world of elves will rise from the ashes.” He stared at the people below with grim determination. “I take no pleasure in it.”

“Oh, well as long as you don’t _enjoy_ it,” Errol said sarcastically. He didn’t respond. She huffed and turned, leaning with her back against the balustrade. “What aren’t you telling me, S— Fen’Harel?”

He didn’t look at her. In the distance, the sun was setting, turning the light a burnished orange. “I must tear down the veil because I am the one who created it, and in doing so, destroyed my people. This plan is merely correcting a mistake that should never have been made. I am righting a great wrong, though I’m sure you won’t see it that way.”

Errol worked her jaw for a moment. _(Confusion: the dizzying rock of a skiff on the ocean.)_ “Why would _you_ create the veil? You, of all people?”

“I thought I was saving the world.” He gave a rueful chuckle. “Perhaps I did: saved and destroyed it in the same breath.”

She was quiet, and he continued.

“The truth is that we are not gods. We never were. The Evanuris were powerful mages who won wars and were placed first on thrones and then on pedestals. They fought amongst themselves, branded elves as slaves and used them as pawns in their personal battles. I fought against them, but it was not enough. When Mythal stepped in, they killed her, and in so doing sealed their fate.”

Errol could barely believe what she was hearing. _(Shock: numb, a body too long left in the cold.)_ “How?”

“I created the veil. Magic permeated everything, and so to truly lock them away, I needed to be able to create cages that could hold them, where no magic could pass and they would be stripped of their power. The veil was necessary for this.”

“What happens when the veil comes down? Won’t they escape?”

“I can deal with them,” he said, finally turning to look at her. His pale eyes scanned her face, ascertaining how she felt following his revelations.

She was silent for a long time, trying to think and feel simultaneously. Then: “Are you sure? Because you mentioned godhood a lot for someone who isn’t a god.”

“Are you a god, now? Or are you merely something far more powerful than she has any right to be? We who hold sway and power are often memorialized as gods, and it’s easy to believe it after a time. I used the term ‘god’ with you because I wanted you to understand what you could be: a being of great power. I meant to explain the reality of it later.”

“So you’re just god-like?”

“In this world with its veil, perhaps. But having power does not make one a god.”

“I’m pretty sure the dreams the elves are having make you seem pretty godlike.”

He looked a little ashamed. “A necessary untruth. They… would not follow me if they didn’t believe. I tried honesty at first, but in the end—”

“This nets you more followers. Just like you wanted to entice me all those times with all those pretty words.”

He smiled softly, a ghost of the tender smile she once knew. The sun was fading fast, and under the plum sky the shadows were long. “It works on them. It did not work on you.”

“Only because I know you. As much as anyone _can_ know you.”

“Once the veil comes down and power is restored to the People, I will no longer have to hide behind the false title. The elvhen will be powerful, and free.”

Errol scoffed. _(Aggression: tiny cuts with the smallest blade.)_ “Oh yes, freedom. You _love_ that idea.”

“I do.”

“I was being sarcastic.”

“I know. But it’s true.”

“Do you hear yourself?” she asked incredulously. “You’re really standing here, calmly talking about _burning the world_ , to bring back something lost thousands of years ago? We’ve moved on since then! What about humans, dwarves, Qunari? What about our friends?”

“It is regretful, but restoring my people is my priority. Errol, you must understand this. I am not being completely unreasonable. You would do the same for your own.”

Errol was quiet for a moment as she gazed out over the elves below. They looked so happy: children with flowers in their hair ran amok in the last of the day’s light, and cooking fires cast the trees in a warm glow. “Thousands of years of diluted blood and lack of magic… How many of these elves will even survive the transition?”

He seemed to choose his words carefully. “They know lives will be lost, but they are willing to try for a better future.”

“So… not many, then.”

“I told you that I take no pleasure in it.”

“You’re doing what they did. What did you call them - the Evanuris? You’re throwing lives away to further your own goal.” _(Disappointment: crumbling stone, once-solid.)_ “I thought you were better than that.”

His tone was a stiff, straight-backed surety that seemed as much to convince himself as her. “Their goal was only ego and destruction. Mine is restoration.”

“Yeah, no ego at all! And if that is the case, why bring me back? Why make me into this?” She gestured to her new body with something approaching disgust.

“The elves will need guidance. I’ve learned that everyone needs someone to look up to, to follow, and if you do not give them a role model they will make their own, often with disastrous consequences. To stop a repeat of the Evanuris of old, I must give them something new. Something better. It is not a job I take lightly. You did the same with the Inquisition. You were a leader.”

“They might have called me the Herald of Andraste, but I wasn’t a Herald, or a god,” she snapped. _(Scorn: the taste of bitter on the tongue.)_ “Neither are you.”

“And I don’t mean for us to be. But your strong leadership drew people to flock to the cause, to be better than themselves. It gave them hope. You and I are the beginning of a new world of hope. Perhaps others will join us, eventually.” He stared at her levelly, clear and convinced. “If we were not here for these people they would fall to chaos.”

“So do it by yourself.”

He stepped closer, palms open, supplicating. “I do not wish to. Had you been a mortal I could have left you in peace. I wouldn’t have wanted you to follow me on this path. But being as you are gave me a hope to no longer be alone. It is a hope I will not abandon.”

“So you destroy and rebuild me, again and again, and expect me to be okay with that?” her voice cracked, and to her embarrassment tears that she couldn’t control flooded her eyes. _(Shame: to be small, small, so small.)_ She felt like a child again, her emotions a mad rush that made no sense, turning everything into a blur.

He was so _damn calm_ , moving toward her like they were having a friendly chat _._ “Time heals many wounds. And we have so much time, now.”

“What you did, to me, to…” She trailed off, suddenly remembering the scene in the cave with startling, blood-stained accuracy, as if it was happening right in front of her. She swallowed a scream. The urge to vomit was almost overwhelming. _(Dread: sticky, wet, sharp – no no this isn’t right!)_ “I thought you said you didn’t use blood magic.”

“I didn’t. Mythal did. The knowledge served me well, in this instance.”

Errol tried desperately to remember what it was to be Tranquil. “That woman. In the cave. Cynthia. You killed her.” _(Horror: a slick of red across a slack neck.)_

“I did not kill her. The man chose to kill her to further his ambition.”

“But she had to die to make this happen.”

He acknowledged this with a sorrowful nod. “Someone did.”

“So you’re responsible for her death.” Her voice was hard and accusing.

Fen’Harel was impenetrable. “I told him his options. He chose the one that furthered his own desires at the cost of another’s life. I am not responsible for that decision.”

“You are so full of shit.” Her anger rose up, cutting across all attempts to subdue it. _(Fury: white, pure.)_ “You are SO full of shit!”

He again stepped closer, his voice softer but no less intense. He was right in front of her now. “And how many have you killed, Inquisitor, to further your ambition?”

“That is not fair,” she said, jabbing a finger at his chest. “I… I had to kill, for self defense, to protect people!”

“In the end, isn’t that what I’m doing? Protecting my people?” He tilted his head. “Perhaps… making the world a better place?”

“It’s not the same!” she insisted.

“Isn’t it? History is written by the victors. Whether someone is a savior or a monster depends on whether or not they succeed at their task.”

It was all too much. _(Need: a crack, a break, a hairline fissure.)_ “You fucking… I could _strangle_ you!” she yelled hoarsely, irrationally, surging forward as if to do just that. He caught her hands.

“I have exhausted you,” he said gently. “You are not used to emotions after your long months without them, and I have told you so much, given you so much to fuel your anger. It must be overwhelming.”

“I _hate you!_ ” she ground out. All she could do was feel: anger, sadness, disbelief, and beneath the surface the confusing mixture of joy and relief and exhaustion, the desire to throw her arms around him and just be here and wanted again, to go back to a time before she ever thought he was capable of planning genocide.

He shook his head. “No, you don’t. But you will have to learn to navigate what you feel again. I don’t judge you for not being able to control yourself. You’ve done admirably so far, better than what I could have expected. Then again, you have always exceeded my expectations.”

“Bite me,” she snarled, and he laughed and bent his head to her ear.

“I believe I already have.” His breath was soft against the scar on her neck, and she couldn’t stop the horrible warmth that rushed through her. _(Desire: heated blood just under the skin.)(Panic: of falling, stomach up around the throat.)_

She jerked away. “You—”

“Rest now,” he said, his eyes glowing. Magic wove around her like the softest blanket, and she slumped forward into his arms. “It would not do to have you exhaust yourself.”

“You’re a… bastard,” she mumbled into his chest. He laughed softly, and it was tinged with sadness.

“Yes, I know.” He pressed his lips to her hair and said, very gently: “It is good to have you back.”

She was falling asleep, and the truth was strange. _(Nostalgia: nestled and tucked with the snow falling against the night.)_ “You too,” she said, the words falling thoughtlessly out of her mouth, and then the excess emotions drained away like water and left her peacefully dark and empty.

 

 


	9. The Spiral

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _No light, no light in your bright blue eyes  
>  I never knew daylight could be so violent  
> A revelation in the light of day  
> You can't choose what stays and what fades away_
> 
> \- Florence and the Machine, No Light No Light

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So you’re going to love me or hate me soon. :D
> 
> FYI I have a Tumblr (http://unstoppablei.tumblr.com). I mostly reblog bc I’m not an artist, sadly— it’s hard to contribute to Tumblr fandom without art. But if anyone has any prompts or questions about my writing/OC/me/etc feel free to drop me a line! I’ll even write drabbles if there’s an interest.
> 
> In RL news, I’m going to see the Welcome to Nightvale live show in DC! Excitement. And if you’re not listening to the (free!) podcast Alice Isn’t Dead, please do. It’s scary and amazing.
> 
> <3!

 

 

**Chapter 9: The Spiral**

 

The library was beautiful and broken, a mess of floating masonry and ancient texts scattered across the floor. Errol was curled in one of the only remaining chairs, her knees to her chin, bare toes peeking out from under a silken dress. Her white hair in its thick fishtail braid fell perpendicular straight down, the only part of her that seemed to obey any general sense of gravity, as she was sitting on what should have been a wall.

She was reading, and had been for a long time. It wasn’t really so much reading as it was sensing the impressions of lives long past. Here, in the Vir Dirthara, the books only looked like books, when in fact they were memories.

She didn’t know how long she had slept, but when she awoke Solas ( _no, damnit, Fen’Harel, Solas is who you once knew, he was your friend, it’s too intimate, stop it)_ had shown her this place. It was empty, and it gave her plenty of space to think as she slowly got used to having emotions again.

Except… now someone was here.

Two someone’s, actually. Errol watched the elves slip through the Eluvian with interest. They were slight and young, their large eyes reflecting like a cat’s in the semi-darkness. They seemed skittish, and awed, one fumbling to light a veilfire torch, the other just staring openmouthed.

“I can’t believe we’re actually here,” the one with the torch said in a hushed voice. She had long brown hair in two braids, and honey colored eyes. “I never thought to see something so beautiful.”

The man was clutching a notebook so tightly his knuckles were white. “It’s… unreal,” he whispered.

His companion jabbed him in the arm. “Loosen up on that Leran, or you’ll crumple all the paper!” she snapped, and he immediately relaxed his hands.

“How do you know where to find the right one? Some of the stacks are on the ceiling!”

She sniffed, clearly enjoying her superiority. “If you were a mage, you’d—”

He rolled his eyes. “Oh yes, regale me with tales of your wondrous magic, oh mage.”

Errol couldn’t help herself: she giggled.

The woman held her torch aloft. “Hello? Is someone there?”

Errol stretched and leapt lightly to the floor, the torchlight catching her as she landed. She gave a little wave. “Hi.”

The elves gaped at her. Errol was sure it was at least in part due to the dress, a silvery diaphanous thing that was _befitting of her station_ or some shit. A short fingerless glove on her left hand covered the Anchor.

“I didn’t think anyone else was here,” the woman said nervously. “Who are you?”

“I’m Errol,” she said, slightly relieved when recognition didn’t cross their faces. She hadn’t been sure if he’d spread propaganda about her yet. “I’m a friend of the boss.”

They both stiffened respectfully like she was military and had just told them to stand at attention. “I’m Namaya, my lady,” the woman said. “This is my twin, Leran.”

“Nice to meet you,” Errol said cheerfully, crossing to them on bare feet. The torches on the walls all lit up, illuminating the broken room with a warm glow. “Can I help you find something?”

“Some of us are allowed to study certain books and bring what we learn to the People,” Namaya said.

Errol was surprised. “He lets you in here?”

“Some of us,” Leran said, still looking wary of her.

“Luckily the information just pops in your head when you look at it,” Namaya said excitedly. “Since we’re still just learning Elvhen. I’m allowed in since I’m one of the best mages here. Leran just wanted to see the library.”

“And protect you!” he said, affronted. “We don’t know what could be in here!”

“Yes, yes, and protect me,” she said, ruffling his hair.

Errol settled herself on a desk that was half-destroyed but still floating in its proper position. “Where are you from? If you don’t mind my asking.”

“Kirkwall,” they said simultaneously.

“Where are _you_ from?” Leran asked. Errol shrugged.

“Here and there. Mostly Ferelden. I never went to a Circle.”

“Lucky,” Namaya said enviously as she crossed the room to a shelf. She pulled a book out and nodded in satisfaction. “See Leran, I told you they were all in order. You worry so.”

Leran was studying Errol with a calculating look. “Who are you, really?” he asked. “You don’t seem like a normal elf, like us. You seem more like Him.”

“Leran!” Namaya gasped, scandalized. “You can’t just compare someone to _Him_!”

“Why not?” he said belligerently, clearly the less devout of the two. “I don’t even use magic and I can see it.”

“I’m… complicated. I’m here to help.” Errol wasn’t sure that was the truth.

“We’ll take all the help we can get,” Namaya said, smiling. “We elves have to stick together if we’re ever going to change the world.” She elbowed Leran as if reminding him of that, and he sighed.

“What brought you here?” Errol asked. “What made you join the cause?”

They looked at each other and shrugged in unison.

“Freedom, of course,” Leran said.

“We spent our whole lives in Kirkwall, the shithole,” Namaya said. “Have you ever been there?”

Errol shook her head. She had been to the Marches only a few times, to close rifts, but had never been to Kirkwall itself.

“It’s a shithole,” Namaya reiterated. “Leran stayed in the alienage while I was sent to the Gallows, an even bigger shithole. I managed to get out when the Circle fell.”

“The alienage was a killing ground for first the Qunari and then the Templars,” Leran said bitterly. “Qunari if we didn’t convert, and Templars… well, it didn’t matter if we had magic or not— they cut us down. The rest of our family is gone. Most of my friends, neighbors… I went looking for Namaya. I thought… that she would need protection, and I had to protect someone.”

“They had informed my family I was to be made Tranquil,” Namaya said. “The Chantry exploded before the ceremony could be carried out.” She smiled fondly at her brother. “He was still going to rescue me though. Thought I would be a sitting duck if I were Tranquil.”

“Why would they make you Tranquil?” Errol asked. She could feel the mage’s power, steady and strong, without a hint of blood magic.

Namaya looked sad. “I fell in love,” she said softly. “It wasn’t allowed.”

“They were going to make you Tranquil for falling in love?” Errol asked incredulously. She remembered Maddox and Samson then, with a pang.

“At the Gallows they made us Tranquil for looking at them wrong,” Namaya said. Her eyes were distant; the pain was clearly fresh, despite the years. “Examples had to be made to keep the others in line.”

“What happened then?” Errol asked after a moment. They seemed so eager and open with their story, like they had been waiting a long time to tell it.

“We got out,” Leran said. “Ran into each other in the street and made for the mountains.”

“The phylacteries were all destroyed in the fighting,” Namaya said. “And there was enough chaos that we could slip by any patrols. We went all across the Free Marches. Decided we would never again live in an alienage, no matter how dangerous it was out there. Then the rest of the Circles started falling…”

“And the sky got a big hole in it,” Leran said dryly. “That was fun. We survived by joining a group of other elves, from cities and Circles. We protected each other. Even in war, most humans wouldn’t travel with us, or tried to make us carry their packs.”

“That’s terrible,” Errol said softly. She knew the elves faced racism but this— mowed down like animals in Kirkwall, shunned even in the aftermath of the Breach. No wonder they wanted something more. She probably shouldn’t ask, but she was curious. “What did you think of the Inquisition?”

“They worked mostly out of Ferelden and Orlais, but some of their agents did come up to the Marches to protect people from the rifts before the Inquisitor closed them,” Leran said. “And they didn’t care what race you were - they protected you.”

“It’s said that _He_ was part of the Inquisitor's Inner Circle before anyone knew who he was,” Namaya said. “I’d like to believe that was true, the humans trusting in an elf at that level. But I was always wary of the Inquisition, formed by a Seeker and with _Knight-Captain Rutherford_ as their military commander.” She sounded disgusted.

Errol shifted uncomfortably on the table. “Did you know him in the Gallows?”

“Everyone knew him in the Gallows,” she said wryly. “He never hurt anyone that I saw, not personally, but his nose was so far up Meredith’s ass he couldn’t see half of what was going on all around him. They say he cozied up to the Inquisitor too. I’m not surprised. He liked being told what to do.”

“I heard he stood up to Meredith in the end,” Errol said. Namaya just scoffed.

“Too little, too late.”

“Humans stick together,” Leran said. “Sure, the Inquisition had some dwarves and Qunari and elves, but their leaders? All human. Their version of saving the world didn’t include the elves starving in the cities. I even heard one of the Inquisitor’s closest friends was a Magister.” He made a face that was almost a snarl. “I can’t wait until we take Tevinter. The chains will be broken.”

“The chains will be broken,” Namaya repeated softly, like a prayer.

“He’s an Altus, actually,” Errol murmured, too quietly for them to hear.

“Anyway, when the dreams started, we knew exactly where we needed to be,” Namaya concluded.

“Do you know what the plan is?” Errol asked.

“He’s going to bring the veil down!” Namaya said excitedly. “We’re going to restore Elvhenan!”

“You don’t worry about everyone else? All the other races?”

“They don’t worry about us,” Leran said. He sounded older than he was. “The nobles rape our women and no one cares about it; they keep us in alienages and no one cares; they even enslave us! Why should we care now?”

“What about the elves here?” Errol asked, leaning forward. “Especially ones like you, Leran, without magic. The world will burn. Many elves will burn too.”

They looked at each other and seemed to communicate silently before turning back to her. “We know the dangers,” Namaya said.

“I would die happy if it meant that we could have the world we were meant to have,” Leran said stoically. “If it meant we would be free.”

Errol knew then that some of this was her fault. If she had cared more about the plight of the elves, if she had made her message more inclusive, if she had _tried_ , then the elves might have seen a different future for themselves. They might have seen a better way out than wholesale destruction. After everything they had been through, who was she to tell them that they were wrong?

“I understand,” she said hollowly, and she did, she really did.

She had been such a fool, to think that she could save the world by herself.

“Thank you for telling me your story,” Errol said. “I appreciate it.”

“Thank you for listening,” Namaya said. “If you are close to _Him_ , let him know that, that…”

“We’re loyal,” Leran said. “To the end.”

“Yes,” Namaya said, holding the book carefully to her chest. “Yes, that’s good.”

“I’ll do what I can,” Errol said, smiling slightly, and they nodded and moved past her to a mostly intact table, whispering over the book in Namaya’s hands. She watched them settle in, then stepped through the Eluvian to another part of the Library. Now she was seemingly upside down, or they were. She was again alone, on a high table swinging her bare feet, and could still see them far below, huddled together against the dark.

Nothing was ever simple. She had spent so long feeling trapped, and unlucky, and railing against how _unfair_ it all was, that she had forgotten about those who had it worse. And that was fine for a normal woman, but she was the Inquisitor. Errol removed her glove and held her marked hand aloft. The Anchor flared, casting soft green light across the room.

She knew that it was fruitless to spend her time searching for a way out of her bargain. She had already approached it from every angle and found it watertight. This was her life now. She was back in Thedas, and this was her life.

Then, almost tentatively, she allowed herself to think of Cullen, just this once, as an indulgence. He had never spoken much of his time in Kirkwall, and she knew he had been different then, afraid and alone. She knew he had spent the years following the destruction of the Chantry as provisional Knight Commander, holding the crumbling city together by the skin of his teeth. She knew how much he had conquered just to be with her. The idea that the old broken and scared Cullen was the only image Namaya and those from Kirkwall would ever have of him was sad, but understandable. He had not done all he could. He knew that, but his regret meant nothing to those who suffered.

She knew the feeling.

She pictured him, his kind eyes, the wind as it ruffled his carefully straightened curls. She pictured his hands, large and gentle, and how his smile pulled the scar on his lip. She loved him still, desperately, more than she should.

The knowledge weighed heavy in her chest. She promised she’d never leave him. She promised that she would find a way back to him. Now she was here again and couldn’t go to him, and it seemed… unfair.

“You went into this with your eyes open,” she said to herself, sternly. “You knew what you were getting into. It’s over. Let it go.”

Cullen was better off without her anyway. He didn’t even know she was back, and hopefully he never would. He would find someone else, a pretty wife who would take care of him and give him children, and he would be happy. In the end, if she couldn’t stop Solas, Errol would see to it that Cullen and his family were safe. It was the least she could do.

Solas. She sighed, turning her thoughts to the elf. In his own twisted way, he was following his conscience. It was stupid and awful, but not senseless. Leran and Namaya had such hope in their eyes, an unwavering acceptance of death if it meant a better life for their people. Errol watched them from afar, eagerly going through their book. This world had destroyed them. Of course they wanted better, just like the mages. She couldn’t hate them for that. She couldn’t even hate Solas for that. She could only hate herself, that she hadn’t done more, that she hadn’t even tried.

She hadn’t forgotten that she was here, alive, full of magic and feeling beautiful emotions like sadness and nostalgia because of Solas. He was a bastard, but he saved her, no matter how much of a devil’s bargain it turned out to be. He didn’t have to come for her under the ice. He could have let her rot on Earth, a Tranquil cursed by her family’s love. A dead Tranquil, frozen in the snow, feeling nothing even in the end.

She thought of Cynthia, dead on the ground, and felt a surge of guilt. Would she still have gone down there if she knew how it would end?

She wanted to say no, but what really scared her was that she wasn’t sure.

Still, she was here now, and bargain or no, she had to try to stop him. Things _did_ have to change in Thedas, but she would not burn the world to do it. The only question was how. He wasn’t going to change his mind, that she was almost certain of. Not with the elves counting on him. Not with her here to keep the loneliness at bay.

Perhaps that was her fault, too. If someone else, someone real and flesh, had been the Herald, he would have been alone in his quest. He wouldn’t have been so righteous, so convinced, without her at his side. Perhaps that Solas could have been swayed.

“Errol Kerr,” she muttered unhappily. “Fucking things up since 1989.”

“Heavy thoughts?”

She looked up to see Solas standing with her on the ceiling, or was it the floor? She hadn’t noticed him slip through the Eluvian. Far below, the elves were still pouring over their book.

“Spiraling thoughts,” she said as he leaned against the table she was on. His tunic was light and looked like a gilded forest, a wolf pelt wrapped around one shoulder.

“Ah,” he said, as if understanding everything. “You do have much to consider, though I hope it’s not all bad.”

She thought of the fierce passion of Namaya, Leran’s deep desire to protect. “Not all, no.” She paused, thinking. “Sol— Fen—”

She wasn’t sure what to call him anymore. She’d been unconsciously referring to him in her head as Solas, and it was getting harder and harder to separate the man from the title.

“You _can_ call me Solas,” he said, smiling a little. “It is my name.”

“I don’t know,” she said, almost playfully. It was easy to fall back into their old banter. “Maybe I’ll just call you Fen. You have too many names.”

He took her teasing gracefully. “If you wish.”

“But anyway, Fen, or Solas, or whoever you are, I was thinking, and... there’s something that I want.”

“Oh?” he asked, straightening. He looked intrigued, his eyes bright, head canting ever-so-slightly to the side.

Errol met his gaze. “A necklace. I promised the person that I would always wear it. I was wearing it when… anyway, I want it.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Do you think to follow me and discover the whereabouts of your body?”

She twisted her mouth, irritated, a small flare of flames against the black. “No, I seek the right of a free-willed person to obtain an object that is mine and has meaning to me.”

He inclined his head. “You are right. You will have your necklace, if it brings you peace.”

She was momentarily stunned, then masked it, turning away. “Thank you.”

“You are welcome. If you would like, we can go now.”

She turned back to him. “We?”

“There is someone who would very much like to see you. While you speak with him I will obtain the necklace. If you’re interested?” He held out his hand.

She regarded him thoughtfully, then placed her fingers in his and stood. The corners of his mouth curled upwards, and she squinted at him. “What?”

“I am simply pleased that you are not afraid of me,” he said.

“I’m not,” she said honestly. “I’ve never been.”

He squeezed her hand. “At least there is that.” His voice was soft. She thought again of Namaya and Leran, freed from their bonds, so hopeful for a new life because of him, and, against her better judgment, she squeezed back.

Their destination, through three more Eluvians and down many winding steps, was unimpressive. It was a grey stone room littered with papers and books, half-eaten meals and stubby candles. There was a man behind the desk, a human man, hunched and so focused on his work that he didn’t even notice them arrive.

It was Kensington.

Errol twitched violently, about to surge forward, but Solas’ hand in hers stopped her.

“He’s very interested in studying this world,” he said, sounding slightly amused. “Ever the scholar. I can respect that.”

“Is he under your protection?” she asked. Her voice sounded broken and raw.

Kensington looked up from his studies. “Oh, hello!” he said in English. “Not quite sure what you said just there but I’m working on it!” His eyes held no recognition as they looked at Errol.

“I promised that I would bring him here safely, not that he’d remain safe,” Solas said in what she now realized must be Elvhen. She had several languages running in her head, and the magic made it so that she could only differentiate them if she really concentrated. “Do as you will. I will return shortly.”

Then he was gone, leaving Errol alone with the one man she could allow herself to hate.

Kensington stared at her with earnest curiosity. “ _Ahn ma_ …” he started in Elvhen, then sighed. “Oh, bugger it all.”

“Hello, Kensington,” she said in English. He brightened.

“No, it can’t be,” he said, approaching her. “Ms. Kerr?”

“The one and only,” she said coolly. “Though I suppose I look a little different now from the last time we spoke.”

“Well,” Kensington said jovially, clasping his hands together and staring at her like he would a bug under a microscope. “You have changed. This is your spirit form, correct? And you’re one of them now, these elves. Fascinating.”

Errol held up her hand, and lightning fizzled in it. Time to stop playing around. “I don’t think you understand that I am going to straight up murder you right now,” she said, ice cold. It felt good to speak in her old vernacular.

His face paled and he backed up. “No, wait, I— you can’t kill me!”

“Why not?” she asked, stepping forward. “You killed Cynthia without a second thought.”

“Fen’Harel said—”

“That he’d get you here. He did. He never said he’d protect you forever.” She bared her teeth. “Next time read the fine print.”

He ducked behind the overflowing desk as if it could save him. “I thought it’s what you wanted! I thought it was what we all wanted!”

“You _slaughtered_ her, for what?!”

“You said you were willing to do anything to cross over! So was I! I thought you of all people would understand!”

“Well I don’t,” she snarled, the lightning growing and changing green as the Anchor flared underneath it.

“I’m sorry!” he cried, cowering. “Please, don’t kill me! You’re not a killer!”

“You have no idea what I’ve done!” she yelled, and fired a warning shot into the wall, where it exploded satisfyingly.

He shrieked and threw his hands over his head. “If you kill me, you’re no better than me!”

“Holy cliche, Batman,” she said, firing another ball of lightning, so close to his head that his thinning hair was singed.

“I’m the only one from Earth that you’ll ever meet again! I’m the only one who will ever know where you come from, who you really are!”

She stopped in her tracks. Shit. He was right. No one else would ever understand her references, her jokes, her knowledge: modern medicine, science, history, the good that could be done with all Earth’s humanity had learned over thousands of years. Without this pathetic, trembling little British man, she was all alone.

_Damnit._

With a petulant snarl she dropped her arm, the lightning retreating.

“You can come out from under there,” she snapped.

“Oh, thank you, thank you,” he said, shakily standing up, his wispy, electrified hair surrounding his shoulders like a burnt cloud. “I can’t thank you enough.”

“Just… shut up,” she said, hanging her head in her hands.

He was quiet for a moment, then: “It’s just that, I don’t have anyone else to talk to. No one speaks English, and I’m attempting to teach myself this “Common Tongue” and “Elvhen” but it’s… quite… slow…” He trailed off as she glared at him. “I’ll… just sit here and be quiet.”

He sat in a rickety chair next to the desk, his hands trembling. “Goodness,” he murmured. “What a mess.”

Errol sat too, on a squat cabinet not entirely covered with papers and books. “Yeah,” she said, softly. “A mess.”

They sat in silence. Eventually, he stood and began to sort through the scattered paperwork on the desk, placing files into neat piles and books into tidy stacks. She saw dictionaries and a table translating English letters to the other languages, simple phrases like ‘Can I have some food please’ written out carefully. She felt a sliver of pity for his isolation.

“Do you need help translating anything?” she asked grudgingly. He paused, surprised.

“Oh, I… yes, that would be wonderful, but I didn’t think…”

“Just send me any questions you have.” She looked around the room, noticing for the first time how much it looked like a cell. “Or anything you need.”

“Thank you,” he said cautiously. “I’m kept here now for my own protection - it seems elves in this area aren’t too fond of humans - but once I can speak the languages I hope to venture out… there is so much to learn, it seems like a beautiful world.”

“It is,” she said, sighing. “Beautiful, and terrible.”

“That… magic, that you did,” he said tentatively. “Might I see some more of it?”

Errol remembered that feeling, the overwhelming desire for change, for magic and beauty in this rough world, so different from the smooth, stainless steel edges of her home. She still hated him, but he was… hers in a way. The only Earthling she’d ever see again.

She waved her hand, and small lights filled the room, along with the sound of “Moonlight Sonata.” He looked around, amazed.

“I never thought I’d hear something so lovely again,” he whispered, watching in wonder as a light gently landed on his shoulder. “Beethoven. How remarkable.”

That was the tableau Solas returned to. He regarded the scene with something like amusement in his eyes.

“Both still standing, I see,” he said in English, and Kensington jumped. He looked at Errol and said, in Elvhen: “I am amazed at your capacity for forgiveness.”

She knew he wasn’t speaking just about Kensington.

Kensington bowed awkwardly but Solas ignored him. “I assume you are finished here?”

“Yes,” she said, then turned to Kensington and said, in English: “I’ll see you again.”

“I… look forward to it,” he said, his voice showing that he was uncertain whether it was a promise or a threat. She smiled at him, all teeth, and enjoyed his discomfort.

Solas chuckled softly and led her out of the room, hand lightly pressing her back.

They made their way through the connecting Eluvians until they arrived back at her room, the rounded white space she had woken up in the first morning and returned to each night. Usually whatever splashy outfit she wore for the outside world melted into something some simple and comfortable once past the threshold, but today her silver dress stayed on, catching the evening light like a moth’s wings.

“If I might ask, why did you spare him?” Solas asked. He lingered in the space between the room and the balcony, facing the wide open sky.

Errol joined him. The breeze smelled like jasmine, cool against her skin. “Nostalgia, I guess,” she said. “I realized I didn’t want to be the only Earthling in Thedas. If he’s gone, then I’m all alone.”

“Not _all_ alone,” he said, and turned to her. Silver flashed as he raised his fingers, showing her his prize. “I have something for you.”

An actual smile broke out across her face. “Oh, it’s perfect,” she said. “Thank you.”

“It’s very light,” he said musingly, turning it so that it glinted.

“It’s cheap,” she informed him. “But it has sentimental value.”

“Here then,” he said, and undid the clasp.

She held her breath as he draped the necklace around her neck, carefully lifting her braid so that it settled against the skin. It was almost weightless, a silly little thing, but the relief of having it back was indescribable.

He didn’t step away when he was done, so she had to look up at him. “Thank you,” she said. “This… this means so much to me.”

“Who is it from?” he asked, idly lifting it with one hand and running his thumb along the word _Forever_.

“Family. The only person who understood why I had to come back.” Her voice was fond, the memory warming her. “She’s my sister.”

“Hm,” he said, gently placing it back against her chest. “And are you still happy that you decided to return?”

“Yes.” His blue eyes were so close, nearly black in the dim light. “No matter what happens, I can feel again, I’m in this place and that’s… worth everything.” She paused, looking down. “I didn’t want to die in the snow.”

He lifted her chin back up. “You know that I wouldn’t have let you.”

She did, then. “Yeah.”

She felt safe, and grateful, a combination she hadn’t expected to feel here, and so didn’t move when his hand slid from her chin to her hair and he stepped even closer, his body warm and humming with magic.

He kissed her, gently at first, then more firmly when she responded. Lust thrummed through her, guiding her actions without thought, until all she could focus on was the softness of his lips, the taste of him, his scent. It was all so familiar; he was so tender and passionate, his fingers trailing down her spine, and he _wanted_ her.

It was so easy to just give in.

And yet—

Logic reared its head, and she broke the kiss. “No,” she said, shaking her head. “This isn’t right. I’m not myself - I’m all emotion, I can’t regulate it yet…”

“You are the most yourself you have ever been,” he said. His arms were still around her but he didn’t attempt to kiss her again, just gazed at her with serious eyes. “You were always very good at caging the feelings that didn’t fit neatly into your worldview, locking them away because they frightened you. You should heed your emotions now. They’re not clouded by logic. They’re telling you the truth.”

“You know I… I’ve always been attracted to you,” she said haltingly, her face turning red. “But that’s it, that’s something easily controllable, something that should be controlled.”

“Why?” he murmured. “Why is it so bad to give in to what you feel? You’re here with me, and everything has changed from what it was before.” He had loosened her braid and was combing his fingers lightly through her hair, and it was pleasant and distracting.

“Everything _has_ changed,” she said, trying to keep her thoughts and voice composed. She gripped the front of his shirt, suddenly intense, as if about to shake him. “What you’ve done, what you’re planning. It’s wrong. I can’t agree with it.”

“Does that really matter here, now?” He bent his head so that his lips were almost touching hers. His voice was low and husky, and she felt desire shoot through her core like an arrow. The hands that had bunched in his shirt were now splayed across his chest, and she could feel his heartbeat. He smelled of the Fade and something sharp, the frayed edge of lightning. “Kiss me, Errol.”

It wasn’t a command, but an invitation. She was burning up. He was right. She had bound herself to him. This was her life now, and she wanted him so badly, and it was so, so easy to—

She kissed him.

 

 


	10. Kintsugi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I'm not here looking for absolution  
>  Because I found myself an old solution_
> 
> \- Florence and the Machine, Bedroom Hymns

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! How has it been almost a year?? I’m excited to be back, but be forewarned there will still be some gaps.
> 
> Why? Because in just a few days I’m going to be pretty busy taking care of the little one kicking the crap out of my insides right now :-) She’s been kind of my whole world for nine months, and she’s not even here yet!
> 
> The other news is that I’ve finished my novel and it’s in the wonderful and capable hands of my agent. Once baby is born we have a few nitpicky revisions to do and then it will be off to (if I’m the luckiest girl in the world) hopefully impress some very important editor. I’ll keep you updated!
> 
> So, on to the story. This chapter was really hard to write and its difficulty is part of why it took so long to post. TBH it needed to be smutty but I haven’t been inspired to write smut, and dancing along that line kept me from finishing it for a long time.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who is still reading, your patience and support is incredibly appreciated!

**Kintsugi**

 

She kissed him.

She kissed him hard, her hands coming up around his neck and back to draw him to her. He responded immediately, savagely, lifting her and moving them both to the bed without breaking the kiss. He leaned on top of her and pressed her spine into the mattress, his tongue working small miracles in her mouth. She heard her muffled groans as if from far away, and then they weren’t muffled as he moved to her neck, laving her scar with his tongue and sparking magic that caused her to buck and cry out.

Yes, this-- in that moment, this was what she wanted. Speed, force, sensation. She didn’t want to think, or remember. She didn’t want to be herself. She was angry, and wrapped in knots, and needed a release, desperately, even if it destroyed her.

She was already destroyed. She had burned her life to the ground. This was just dancing in the flames.

It happened so fast. Magic roiled inside of her, a coursing heat and electricity that made her whole body hum. Everything pulsed at the razor edge of orgasm, holding but not tipping her over. Clothes were rucked up; he pinned her hands above her head and she wrapped her legs around his waist, all primal need, urging him on. Her mind was white static noise, beautifully blank except for sensation, the polar opposite of being tranquil.

He lowered his forehead to hers in the briefest of pauses. “Tell me that you want this,” he said. His lovely voice was a hoarse rasp, barely recognizable in its hunger, but he was giving her a way out, one last chance before she burned her final bridge.

“I want this,” she gasped. It was too late to go back. “Please, Solas, I--”

Her words ended in a cry as he entered her with a force that would have hurt if she wasn’t so ready. She felt split open, flayed in the best possible way.

“Finally,” he growled, all restraint gone, and then he bit her on her scar like a wolf and fucked her.

She knew there would be bruises. She wanted them. She didn’t want magic to wipe them away. His pace was punishing, hands around her wrists and then on her hips, fingers sinking a vice grip into the soft flesh. She dug nails into his back hard enough to tear the fabric.

“Harder,” she gasped. She wanted punishment. She wanted to be emptied and filled up again with something else. Tender lovemaking was in the past; it was gone, left forever in another man’s arms. It had no place here.

He complied, and her old life fell away.

* * *

 

Wakefulness came slowly, sleep heavy and sticky like molasses, heady and rich and wanting to drag her back down. The light beyond her eyelids was the pale honey hue of the morning sun. Her cheek rested against a chest, firm, warm, an arm looped around her.

In the first moments, her sleep-addled mind accepted automatically that this was Cullen. She was loose-limbed and exhausted and sore, and had woken up this way many times in the past. What other explanation could there be?

Slowly, her mind began to register oddities. The heavy rustle of a thousand trees outside, not the wind-whistle of Skyhold. The air smelled of the magic that tingled lightly on her skin. The chest, which moved with a steady rhythm, was wrong: too smooth, the muscles too lean, and when she cracked her eyes open, far too pale.

Oh God. Oh Christ on a Cracker. Oh Lordy.

Oh no.

No no no.

“I know that you’re awake.”

He sounded amused, as if he saw the swirling thoughts sticking to the inside of her head. The arm around her started to move as he dragged his fingertips up and down, from her hip to her shoulder, an indulgent, lazy caress. It felt far too good to be safe.

Damnit.

Errol opened her eyes and found herself staring at a torso. Luckily everything beneath it was covered in a silky sheet.

“Will you look at me?”

Slowly, she raised her head and turned to him, keeping the rest of her body still, like she had skipped ‘fight or flight’ and gone straight to frozen. He was smiling at her.

“Good morning.”

Errol swallowed, hard. “I, uh…” Her face felt like she could fry an egg on it. “I, we… I mean… ah… good morning.”

She just… couldn’t think. What was she supposed to do? She’d slept with Solas, who should be her enemy, or was it everyone else who was her enemy now? Either way he was still… not someone she should have slept with. How could this have happened?

Her mind flashed to the night before and she somehow flushed an even darker scarlet. Oh right, that’s how. Against her will she felt heat coil in her belly at the thought.

Damnit, it had been good. Very good.

But still. Bad idea. Right?

He watched the emotions flicker across her face, his arm still running gently up and down her side, like soothing a skittish mare.

“You seem nervous.”

She let out a sound that was almost a laugh. “I, ah… I just never expected to find myself like this… with you.”

His other hand came up to lift her chin and draw her toward him with a steady, quiet strength. “I did,” he murmured, and kissed her, the unhurried kiss of a lover, confident that she wouldn’t draw back.

She didn’t.

The heat was now an insistent pulse between her legs, so heavy and persistent it almost made her squirm in an attempt to put pressure on it. It matched an answering pulse in the scar on her neck, a feedback loop of desire and sensation that flowed from him to her and back again, building on itself.

Magic was really a damnable thing, sometimes.

She was nearly on top of his chest now, the hand that had been on her chin gently stroking the sensitive ridge of her ear, the other drawing lazy circles from her hip to her ass. He kissed her like he was guiding her, drawing her in. He suckled on her lower lip before finally slipping his tongue into her mouth, coaxing her to join him.

His every movement made his intentions very clear: he was going to take her apart quietly, carefully, until she understood that last night was not a fluke.

“I don’t…” she said haltingly, pulling away just enough to speak. “I don’t want you to be gentle.”

“I know,” he said. “But that is why I must be. I won’t be used only as a tool to punish yourself, vhenan.”

She flushed and wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I don’t know what you--”

“I have done you a great disservice in the name of the greater good,” he said. “I know that your heart is split, and I know how you truly feel about me. You are in a difficult situation. Perhaps--” He paused and drew her chin up and her eyes back to him. “You should not punish yourself for allowing some small happiness.”

She didn’t have anything to say to that. It felt like all she deserved was punishment, heaping servings of guilt to keep her moving. It was all she had left. She wasn’t sure where happiness fit into that equation.

“I don’t know if I can do that,” she answered honestly.

“Why don’t we start with this,” he murmured, and his hand slid down to the slick juncture between her legs, long fingers brushing against her with a gentleness precise enough to almost be cruel. She bucked into him but it did nothing to deepen his feather-light strokes. The barely-there touches were infuriating and left her dry-mouthed, wanting more.

“This is your version of gentle?” she gasped, clenching the sheets in lieu of clenching him, and the corner of his lip curled into a look that could only be categorized as smug.

“A lesson you still must learn,” he said, and leaned in to ghost his breath on her ear, as if gifting her a secret. Magic unspooled its tendrils and joined the agonizingly slow dance of his fingers, leaving her writhing and still somehow bereft. “Something need not be forceful to be torture.”

Was he slyly giving her what she needed or tricking her into accepting more tender lovemaking? Or was he simply breaking her down to build her back up as what he wanted, gold in all of her cracks? Errol wasn’t sure anymore, but she kissed him anyway and pulled his body to hers, the questions tucked away for later, stifled in a haze of need.

* * *

 

_It was cold, a cold that licked her skin with a cat’s rough tongue and made icicles of her bones. The ground gleamed white, and the sky was too big, ribbons of green dancing in forever darkness without stars._

_She opened her mouth and tried to scream, but heard only the wind howling over the snow._

_The cold sank into her brain. Black pressed down from above. The world closed in and became still. Her heart slowed, fear-numbed and frosted. The dark was inside of her. Her mind grew heavy and quiet even as the wind screamed._

_She reached for the green borealis but it danced away. Everything was black and white and cold. Every moment the ice-slicked hands of tranquility wrapped themselves tighter around her neck._

_The dancing lights moved further away. She tried to reach for them, but her fire was almost out. Peace settled on her shoulders like a shroud, and this time she knew she would never feel anything ever again._

Errol woke screaming.

Instantly magic and arms wrapped around her, comforting and real. She still screamed, throat raw, emotion like pins and needles in her brain.

“It was a dream, Errol. You are safe.”

She gasped and buried her head in his chest, for once unwilling to fight. “I was Tranquil again,” she sobbed. “I could feel it taking me and there was nothing I could do.”

“Oh, vhenan.” He sounded truly upset. “That will never happen to you. You are safe here.”

The night air was quiet, the only sounds the tree insects and her sobs. The sheets pooled like liquid silk around their waists. He smelled like magic and the forest.

“If it does, if something happens or someone tries too… if you can’t stop it…” She lifted her tearstained face to his and he nodded.

“I will kill you.”

“Promise?”

He kissed the top of her head. “I promise, vhenan. You never have to worry about Tranquility again.”

She breathed a deep sigh of relief, her muscles finally unwinding. “Thank you,” she murmured. He said nothing, just held her and hummed some ancient song until her breathing evened out and she fell once again into the Fade.

* * *

 

“It’s time for you to tell me,” she said, resting her chin on his chest and regarding him with steady eyes. He closed his book and looked at her quizzically in the golden morning light.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific,” he said. It struck her suddenly how domestic the scene was, him reading a book in bed, one hand gently stroking her hair, and how quickly it had happened.

It wasn’t domestic, not really. Not at all. Errol didn’t want to think of it as laying a trap but she knew that this was a difficult subject and she wanted him like this: relaxed, comfortable, and open to suggestion.

Several days had passed since the first of her nightmares. They didn’t come every night, but most nights they waited, lurking, their long tongues waiting to siphon off her emotions and leave her empty. Solas had pointed out that she could create safe spaces in the Fade where the nightmares could not reach her, but she refused. She needed them, in a way. She needed to remember why she was here.

“Tell me about everything,” she said. “What’s happening out there now? What’s changed since I’ve been gone?”

As usual he saw right through her. “You want to know about the Inquisition.”

“Are you surprised?”

“Only that it took this long.”

She toyed with the soft edge of the sheet. “I wasn’t ready before. I was an open wound… anything and everything hurt. Hearing about them would have been unbearable.”

“And now?”

She shrugged. “Scabbed over, if we’re going with this metaphor.”

“Ah yes, scabbed over is exactly the way I wish to think of you,” he said lightly, and she raised an eyebrow. It almost sounded teasing.

She poked his chest. “Well?”

Solas ran a hand over his head as he thought. It was still shaved at the sides but he had started to grow out the top. His hair was a rich chestnut color of surprising depth; at times it looked dark as earth, but when the sun hit it it warmed with hues of deep red. It made him look regal, and feral, like the great wolf he was supposed to be.

“The Inquisition lives on,” he said, “though its main task now seems to be hunting me. Seeker Pentaghast is its new Inquisitor, a title from what I hear she does not enjoy. The former spymaster remains Divine. They live, all of them, hale and healthy despite their repeated attempts to interfere with my plans.”

“What do they do?”

“Dog my steps as I search for important and forgotten artifacts of my people. They have found nothing and it keeps them reasonably busy.”

“You’re leading them on a wild goose chase,” she said, and he stared at her blankly for a moment before she realized he didn’t understand the idiom. “You’re leading them around to keep them distracted,” she clarified.

“Naturally,” he said, all casual arrogance.

She filed the information away for later contemplation. “What about the rifts?”

“They’re still active. Without you, no one has the means to close them.”

“Even you?”

“Without the orb or the mark on your hand, I am without that power.” He sounded genuinely unhappy about it. “It’s one of the reasons I allow the Inquisition its continued existence. They set up barriers around active rifts and keep them on constant patrol, slaying any demons that might come through. They do a great service to their people.”

“The same people who will die when the veil falls.” Her voice was monotone.

“I wish them no ill will, and until that day they deserve to live in relative peace,” Solas said, moderately affronted. “I am not a monster.”

“You say tomato, I say tomahto,” Errol said in a sing-song voice, quietly pleased at his huff of non-understanding.

“Your world does have the oddest idioms.”

“We’re talented like that.” She hummed a little as she thought, a habit that she’d inadvertently picked up from him. “These rifts. I’d like to close them.”

“I’d like that too,” he said, easily.

“Because you’re not a monster,” she said, wry but not angry. He noted it.

“You are remarkably calm. I’m not complaining, but I am unused to your lack of…”

“Piss and vinegar?”

“Idioms are the theme today, I see,” he said dryly.

“I guess I’m just holding out hope that someone will stop you. It can’t be me, and it’s exhausting to hold onto that level of anger all the time.” It seemed wrong say it while curled naked on his chest, but he only sighed and looked away, one arm tightening around her back as if to hold her there.

“No one can, you know. Stop me.”

“Perhaps,” she said. He said nothing. “So when can I start to close rifts?”

After a long pause he looked back at her, and for just a moment there was something weary in his eyes. “We’ll leave tomorrow.”

“We?”

“You certainly don’t think you’ll go alone, do you? At least not until I’m confident that you’re once again in complete control of your powers and able to handle yourself.”

Her eyes widened and she leaned in. “And then? You’d really let me go alone?”

“As you said, you can’t stop me. Not to be harsh, but you have nowhere to go, and can tell no one what you know. This is your home now. When you are ready, you may enter and leave at your will.” He ran his thumb lightly across her lips, his blue eyes intense. “You will always return to me.”

It wasn’t a command, but a statement, and when he kissed her she let him.

After all, he was right.

 

 

 


	11. The Selkie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can you believe I’m posting again? My babe is five weeks old and pretty much the cutest baby to ever exist ever. Not that I'm biased or anything ;-) Please forgive any typos or minor continuity errors, I’m pretty sleep deprived.

 

**CHAPTER 11: The Selkie**

 

“I’m leaving tomorrow for a few weeks.”

She’d entered quietly, and Kensington started when she spoke. “Oh, I… is that so?” he asked, fumbling to put his glasses back on. A huge tome lay open in front of him, and he’d been nose to yellowed paper, his fingers stained with ink as he scribbled notes into a small book. He looked like a mouse, hunched in the perpetually too-dim light, eyes lined with exhaustion, clothing a rumpled mess.

Errol felt a small thrill of satisfaction at his discomfort, but she didn’t let it show on her face.

“Would you like anything from the wider world?” she asked solicitously. “Fresh clothes, perhaps? Special food? More books?”

“Certainly not more books,” he said with a shadow of his genial chuckle. “I have enough here to last me ten lifetimes. Perhaps…” he trailed off and leaned back, his eyes suddenly sharp. “Why are you offering this to me? After what I did…?”

_Because I might need you, someday. Because I have so few cards in my hand and I need all the leverage I can get._ “Like you said before, we’re the last Earthlings either of us will ever see. You’re not my favorite person, but you’re one of mine. I take care of my own.”

He stared at her a moment longer, then looked away, seemingly satisfied. “Ah. Well then, new clothing would be lovely. I get to bathe once a day, but I’ve yet to be able to communicate my need for a new wardrobe. It’s getting rather… stiff.” He wrinkled his nose. “Quite unpleasant.”

“Anything else?”

“Perhaps some chocolate, if they have it here, and…” He paused. “I don’t dare to hope they have anything like a good brandy?”

She smiled, and it was genuine. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you… Errol.” He seemed hesitant to use her name, as if he still had a hard time internalizing that the glowy elf in front of him was the same bedraggled human he’d fucked over in another world. “I am thankful that you are here. I hope that perhaps we can speak more. It feels good to hear my language again.”

“I’d like that,” Errol lied. “I’d like that a lot.”  


* * *

 

Energy crackled and boomed. A despair demon reared up on her left, and Errol turned it into a mess of useless particles with barely a thought. She felt charged and electrified, a conduit for the power that pulsed through her and made the very roots of her hair tingle. Using magic was a high she’d never forgotten, like plugging herself into the sun.

The last demon vanished. Above then, the rift still hummed, fine lines cracking the illusion of reality and warping the Fade into a painful wound.

“Good,” Solas said. Neither of them had broken a sweat. “You’re getting better.”

Errol beamed and bounced on the balls of her feet, not because of the lukewarm praise but because of the sheer high of magic in her veins. “I am, aren’t I?”

They’d been traveling for three weeks. At times it felt just like the old days, sleeping under trees, cooking on a fire, long days on horseback, freckles on her nose. She knew that he could use an Eluvian to get to their destinations faster, but she thought he enjoyed the quiet travel as much as she did. It felt like stepping into the past, before life and their relationship had gotten so messy and twisted.

Still, it wasn’t exactly like the past. He still pitched his own tent, but more often than not spent the night in Errol’s. He would stay away if asked, but she let him in. She still wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Mostly she tried not to think about it.

It hadn’t been a surprise to find out that the only way in and out of the elves’ hidden forest was via Eluvian. She wasn’t even completely sure it existed in this world, as it didn’t seem accessible from any conventional point. The mirror they had emerged from was in Southwest Orlais, on the edge of the Tirashan Forest, and they’d been traveling generally North in a zigzag pattern, hitting every rift that they met along the way. There were only a few dozen left in all of Thedas, but she had never traveled this far West with the Inquisition, leaving a swath of angry rifts still left to close. Errol felt them now, an inexorable pull that led her straight to the nearest one.

“It’s time,” Solas said, and Errol nodded and held out her hand. Solas watched closely, primed and ready to intervene. Closing the rifts was the most dangerous part of the job now; being so close to the hurt and bleeding Fade made her spirit form fluctuate precipitously, and if she lost control he would have to intervene and cut off the connection until she was ready to try again.

Her palm flared with that familiar feeling of opening, and the pins-and-needles of a wound being sucked clean. The rift pulsed angrily in time with the power surging from her hand, until it finally and with a burst of pain knitted itself together and fizzled out of existence.

“Boo yah!” she sang, shaking her hand to dispel the itch of lingering magic. “That’s what, five, six rifts I haven’t needed any help with?”

“Four,” he said with the shadow of a smile. “Don’t overinflate your accomplishments. They are numerous enough.”

“Four then, Fen,” she said haughtily. “But who’s counting?”

He laughed a little into his hand, as if attempting to disguise it as a cough. He seemed lighter out here, away from his people and the burden of what he was doing, like they were normal mages doing good in the world, like the world wasn’t about to end by his hand.

Errol looked away, a frown breaking the rush of closing the rift. Everything they were doing was just pretend anyway, saving people who were doomed to die. She shouldn’t forget that.

“I believe that you are ready to close rifts on your own,” he said blithely.

She perked up; maybe that was his intent. “Really?”

“You show no signs of instability in this form, and I must shortly journey alone to meet with several of my agents. I am confident you will perform admirably.”

She beamed, momentarily elated, then hesitated. “This meeting with your agents…”

He cocked his head and stared at her. She sighed and shrugged, turning away. “Never mind. I don’t really want to know.”

He continued to gaze at her a moment longer, then continued. “First, however, there is a temple nearby. One of June’s. There are powerful wardings that I could use your help with. I’d also like you see it, to see what we once had and what it has crumbled to.”

Fifteen snarky replies filled Errol’s head ( _“Oh, until you destroyed everything?”_ and _“You mean what you’re willing to burn the world to get back?”_ the most prominent among them) but she bit her tongue and simply said: “Sure, I’d like that.”

He frowned a little, as if disappointed by her placid response, but said nothing, only stretched a hand toward the thick jungle several miles away as if to say _after you_. Errol marched ahead, feeling stiff and tired and somehow like something had been lost, but she wasn’t sure what or how to find it.

Errol missed Cullen then, suddenly and inexplicably. She hoped that she would never see him again, that he would never see her like this.

She didn’t think she could bear it.

* * *

  
Cullen cut through the underbrush with his sword. Even after their scouts had carved a path, it was like the vines never ended. Sweat rolled down his brow. This climate was making even the trek across the Western Approach seem like a dream. He’d abandoned his surcoat and modified his armor, but nothing would help the sticky, thick humidity gathered under his clothing. Not to mention the Approach’s sand was still trapped everywhere, including his socks, bedroll, and other places sand should really never be.

This was the fourth untouched elven ruin they had explored, and by far the most remote.

“There,” Cassandra announced, her dark hair plastered against her head. “It is just ahead.”

“Thank the Maker,” Varric grumbled, swiping ineffectually with a machete at hanging vines, Bianca strapped to his back. “This kinda place is not my forte.”

Dorian had a constant layer of ice shimmering on his skin, and the forest froze and shattered before him. “I don’t know, it’s not all that bad.”

“Yeah!” Iron Bull said ahead of them, swinging his two handed axe in a wide arc like he was fighting an army of Darkspawn. “This is nothing compared to Seheron in the summer. Quit whining, you big babies.”

Cullen clenched his teeth. As much as he appreciated how much of the Inquisition was still around, sometimes they could be a bit spirited for his taste.

Cassandra had been quick to see the necessity of this quest, Iron Bull was eager to do anything that had the potential to put him in the thick of battle, and Dorian tagged along where Bull went. Varric, with his inside knowledge and writer’s mind, told Cullen he knew this wasn’t going anywhere good, and that he felt he should be there when it all went south.

Cullen thought of the rest of the once-famed “Inner Circle.” Sera was back at Skyhold - she hadn’t wanted anything to do with “elfy shite.” Vivienne was at Halamshiral, Leliana was Divine, with Zevran as the new Spymaster. Josephine was still at her post. Blackwall and the rest of the Wardens were ensconced at Weisshaupt. Cole was at Skyhold as well, sometimes; he tended to wander off on his own now, as if lost, gone for weeks only to show up without warning in the middle of the night. He was almost human, but haunted to distraction by Errol’s loss; to Cullen, it seemed as if he was forever searching for his lost connection to the Fade, desperate to enter it and find her again.

Suddenly the forest ended and Cullen found himself at the base of a great and crumbling temple. It had been mostly taken over by roots and vines, but it still stood, and it was beautiful, the inlaid gold and gems shining in the fiery afternoon light.

“Now _that_ ,” Iron Bull grunted, leaning on his axe, “is a temple.”

“Magnificent,” Dorian breathed.

“Perhaps if we enter there will be shade,” Cassandra said with barely a glance at its beauty. Cullen found himself agreeing. He could marvel later. It was _hot_.

They circled it until they found a wall that had almost completely caved in. Stepping through and watching for traps, they found themselves in a blessedly cool room only dappled with sunlight, a long reflecting pool in the center, plants thriving at the base of winding statues, and maybe fifteen feet away from them--

Solas.

For a moment, Cullen thought him merely a vision. The elf stood there blinking at them, in a simple linen tunic and leggings, the jawbone still around his neck, his bare feet wrapped, his hair a rich brown, shaved at the sides and gathered in a ponytail at the back of his head.

“Well,” he said, in the same calm voice he always had. “The Inquisition. This is certainly unexpected. You’re a long way from Skyhold.”

Cullen’s blood roared in his ears. He was real. He was here and he was _real_.

“You--” he started, stepping forward. Cassandra gripped his arm. Cullen wanted to shake her off.

“You know why we are here, Solas,” she said brusquely. “Or should we say Fen’Harel?”

He inclined his head. “Of course, you’ve spoken to Sera. Or your new Spymaster, the assassin. What a Divine you have, putting a Crow in her former seat. Though, she never did shy away from her own past, did she?”

“Whatever you are here for, you will not get it,” Cassandra said, and he raised an eyebrow.

“Whatever I am here for? So you do not know? You really are falling behind, Seeker, if you’re running into jungles without even knowing what it is you seek.” He paused, his gaze calculating. “However, I hear congratulations are in order. Seeker is no longer your title, is it?”

“Do not _toy_ with me, Dread Wolf,” she snapped, hand still holding Cullen in a vice grip. “You must know that I am the Inquisitor now.”

“I do,” he said. “However, I find the whole situation odd. I thought the title was supposed to be for life.”

“Errol is _gone_ ,” Cullen growled, his voice coming out rougher and more feral than he would have liked. “Because of your machinations, she lost _everything_ , and now she’s _gone_.”

Cassandra glanced at him but said nothing, and he knew he’d be answering questions later. He didn’t care though, didn’t care that Cassandra didn’t know the truth, he had Solas now and he wouldn’t let him get away.

“Is she?” Solas said. “Are you so sure?” Cullen made a strangled sound in the back of his throat but Solas just turned and called, peacefully, “Vhenan, could you join me for a moment?”

The whole world went suddenly, painfully still.

An elf slipped out from a corridor, her head down, her eyes studying a fractured statue in her hands. Her long white hair was pulled into thick a braid that hung over one shoulder, the tips of her sharp ears poking out from the soft curls that hazed around her head in the heat. She was dressed in leggings and foot wraps, an off-the-shoulder tunic and loose belt.

She stepped into the sun, and the light hit the scar on the side of her neck, the braid a pale rope down the other side.

Cullen’s fists clenched and his breath hitched. _No._

“So there’s definitely something here,” she said, completely engrossed in her contemplation. “These are puzzle statues, and they’re broken. Once we fix ’em up we should be able to arrange them and get in. What is it with you people and puzzles, anyway?”

Errol’s voice, her cadence, her speech. The world started to spin.

When she heard nothing but silence she looked up. “Fen?”

Then she saw Cullen. Their eyes locked, and she froze, her hands spasming around the broken statue in her hands. Her eyes were just as green as he remembered. On one hand, the anchor flared slightly, reacting to her mental state. Her mouth hung slack, her eyes huge and hurt, as he drank in every curve on her face, which was identically, perfectly hers, except for the pointed ears and the slightly elongated body.

She wasn’t in the Fade, a drifting spirit. She was clearly, impossibly, physically real, elf or not, and she was here, in front of him.

With Solas.

“What-- what is this?” Cassandra asked, clearly shaken. Luckily, the rest of them stayed silent, except for Varric’s quietly murmured _“shit.”_ “What kind of game are you playing, Solas?”

Errol’s eyes wrenched away from Cullen’s and shifted to Cassandra, then to Iron Bull, Varric, Dorian, then back to Cullen and finally to Solas. They were filled with tears. “You _bastard_ ,” she whispered, then dropped the statue and ran from the room, darting out of the shadows of the temple and into the jungle as if she had never been there.

“I demand that you answer me, Wolf,” Cassandra snarled, hand on her sword.

Solas didn’t look at her, but instead looked right at Cullen, his eyes pale and fathomless, his face carefully blank, though Cullen thought he saw the faintest of curves at the corner of his mouth. “Ask your Commander. He knows better than anyone what she is, though he knows and always has known less than anyone what she will be.” He finally looked at Cassandra. “Keep the title. She is your Inquisitor no longer.”

He turned as if to leave, and Cassandra drew her sword. The rest followed suit, Iron Bull’s massive axe in his hands, Bianca cocked and ready, Dorian’s magic cracking the air and sending out the fine smell of ozone. Only Cullen didn’t move, as if he had been frozen by something far stronger than an entropy spell.

“You’re going nowhere,” Cassandra said. Solas stopped but didn’t turn around.

“Goodbye, Inquisitor. I grant you grace this one time, for her sake. Do not follow us. Enjoy the time you have left. It will not be long.”

“You--” Cassandra started furiously, but he was gone, without the slightest trace of magic or trickery to show where he had gone.

* * *

 

Cullen crouched by the stream and refilled his water skin, then used the cool water to splash his face, letting it drip down his neck. Around him, the forest was quiet except for the sound of birds and the babbling of the brook.

Explaining to Cassandra what had really happened to Errol hadn’t gone well at all, especially once she realized that Dorian and Varric had already known. There had been shouting, Cassandra’s usually stern face crumpled in betrayal as she absorbed the fact that her friend, her Inquisitor, had been a spirit all along, and that Cullen had lied to her for years. He watched the heartache turn then to stone, her belief and hope stripped away into something more bare and brittle, and the yelling had turned into an icy silence.

Cullen cupped his hands and dipped them in the stream again, drinking deeply before wiping the remaining sweat from his face. He didn’t know how to return to the camp, how to explain himself or regain Cassandra’s trust. Everything seemed broken beyond all repair.

When he looked up, _she_ was sitting there.

He stared, convinced that if he blinked she would vanished. She was perched on a rock, her toes bare on the sun-warmed stone, staring into to the water, completely unmoving. She didn’t look at him.

Finally he spoke. “Errol?” His voice cracked; he felt that if he moved even an inch she would flee into the woods like a spooked halla.

Her pointed ears twitched, but she still didn’t look up. The sun filtered golden onto her white hair. “There is a fable, in the world that I come from,” she said, so softly that he had to strain to hear her. “It tells of a creature called a Selkie, a seal that can shed its skin to become a woman. They are beautiful women, and the men who spy them always wish to have them for their own. But a Selkie will always choose the ocean, unless the man steals her seal-skin and hides it. When he does so, she will follow him and be dutiful, but the day that the Selkie finds her skin again she will always choose freedom, and vanish back into the sea, and he will not be able to capture her again.”

She finally looked at him, her eyes huge and green and pained, like they were trying desperately to tell him something. Then, before he could say a word, she was gone, and he was alone again.

Cullen stared at the spot where she had been for a long time, half-convinced it had been an apparition. Finally he stood and made his way back to camp with a strange numbness. He didn’t even feel the heat anymore.

What _was_ that?

“Hey Curly, you okay? You look like you’re about to lose whatever’s in your stomach.”

“If that’s the case just… do it downwind, won’t you?”

Cullen stared blankly at Varric and Dorian. Cassandra touched him lightly on the arm, concern breaking through her anger. “Cullen, are you all right?”

“I…” he said, stumbling, unsure. “I saw her.”

He felt Iron Bull on his other side, guiding him to a log by the cooking fire. “Sit, Commander,” Bull ordered gently.

“What happened?” Cassandra asked. “What did she say?”

“Clearly nothing good,” Varric muttered.

“She said… nothing,” Cullen said, still in disbelief. “She barely looked at me. She told of some strange folk tale from her home world and then just left.”

“Back up,” Bull said. “Tell us exactly what she said.”

Cullen repeated the tale as best he could. When he was finished, Cassandra shook her head, looking disgusted.

“She makes no sense. Instead of helping us, she mocks us with useless stories.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure about that, Seeker,” Varric said. He met Bull’s eye and an understanding seemed to pass between them. “I think she was telling you a lot more than just a story.”

“What do you mean?” Cullen asked, running his hand through his hair. “I was hoping for answers, and I got…”

“A metaphor, Cullen,” Bull said gently, putting his massive hand on Cullen’s shoulder. “She gave you answers, just not in the way you were thinking.”

“Probably not allowed to say anything straight to us,” Varric agreed.

“You military minded folk, so literal,” Dorian said. “Even _I_ understood it was a metaphor. Or an analogy, if you will.”

“If you understand so much, then tell us what she meant,” Cassandra said in an irritated voice.

“She’s the Selkie,” Bull said. “And Solas is the man who wanted her.”

“What he’s saying is, we know she’s a spirit again and working with Solas. But we didn’t know why,” Varric said. “Now it all makes sense. I’m willing to bet all my gold that Solas has her human body stashed somewhere. And until we get it back, she’s stuck doing what he says.”

“Until we get it back?” Cassandra sputtered. “You actually think we are going to help her? After what she’s done?”

“’Course we are,” Bull said. “She’s our boss. She saved the world. And if Solas is really holding her strings, she’s in a lot of trouble. Which means the _world_ is in a lot of trouble.”

Cullen was still staring silently at the small cooking fire. Varric looked at him sideways. “You know you’re the ocean in all of this,” he said, in a gentle voice. “Freedom. What she wants to return to.”

“Must be the reason she’s back here in the first place,” Bull agreed. “Got herself in over her head.”

Cullen closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. “How does this even happen?” he asked, exhaling harshly. “Did she… make some kind of _deal_ with him? He couldn’t have just walked into her world and snatched her away like a fisherman stealing a skin. And is it…” Cullen couldn’t finish the words, but the thought played out in his head. Was it his fault? Did she come back for him? He shuddered to think what was happening to her if she truly wasn’t working with Solas of her own volition. Was all of this because of him, because he couldn’t let her go?

“Dunno,” Bull asked, sounding unconcerned. “Guess we’ll just have to ask her the next time we see her.”

“Next time?” Dorian asked, and Bull grinned wickedly in the firelight.

“I have a plan, Kadan, don’t you worry.”

 

 


	12. Rifts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Man, it is crazy hard to find time to write when you have a baby! All I want to do is sleep! So forgive any typos, my proofreading of this chapter wasn’t as thorough as usual due to the aforementioned lack of time and sleep deprivation. Thank you so much to everyone who commented and kudo-ed, it means a lot to me and keeps me writing! Next chapter we get action, more game characters, and a POV change!

**Rifts**

 

 

Errol didn’t expect to ever see the Inquisition again, so it was a shock when she closed a rift in Southern Ferelden and a moment later heard a familiar voice.

“Still kicking demon ass, eh, boss?”

She turned and Iron Bull was there, emerging from within a dense copse of trees. Her mouth worked silently for a long moment.

“Speechless, huh? Oh yeah, I still got it.” He preened and flexed his muscles. “Nice work, by the way.” He nodded to the spelled guards slumped over behind the barricade, their chests lightly rising and falling as they slept.

“Bull, I… you… what are you doing here?” she stuttered when she could get words out. “How did you even know where I’d be?”

“I didn’t,” he said, ambling up to her with an easy smile, as if nothing had changed.

“So how…”

“We knew rifts had been closing in a pattern, as if someone was traveling by foot across Orlais and Ferelden. Once we saw the pattern it was easy to figure out your general area.”

“But you had no idea which rift I’d be at,” she pointed out. His grin widened.

“Why do you think I’m here alone?”

She paused, the answer hitting her hard. “You mean there’s someone at every rift?”

“Every one you’re likely to hit, based on your trail.” When a dark look crossed her face, he shook his head. “And don’t think you can avoid us by changing up the pattern. There aren’t that many rifts left. If you want to close them all you’re going to have to face us sooner or later.”

“I could just spell you.”

“But you won’t.”

He said it with such confidence. She looked away, arms crossed, squinting into the wind. It was a beautiful day, the blue sky lightly dotted with clouds over the Ferelden countryside, the fresh wind gently pulling her hair out of its braid. “Yeah, I won’t.”

“So, boss,” Bull said, killing what could have been an awkward silence as he settled against a tree, his massive horns nearly brushing the lower branches. His one eye surveyed her with his usual sharpness, taking in every body cue and movement of her eyes, her well-worn travel clothing and foot wraps, the sharp tips of her ears, the scar on her neck. His eye lingered there the most. “Working for Solas? I’m surprised, and that doesn’t happen often. Guess it makes sense, though. He’s got your body hidden away somewhere.”

She smiled a little. “I knew you’d work it out.”

“Pretty basic metaphor you laid out for Cullen there,” he said, and she tried not to wince at the name.

“I had to keep it simple for those who aren’t professionally trained to read between the lines,” she said, and he laughed.

“I see your point. So what are the terms of this deal of yours?”

She pondered for a moment, then decided there was no harm in answering. “He brought me over. He’s got my body. I work for him. I don’t have to do anything against my morals, I don’t have to fight you, but I can’t betray him. Simple as that.”

“I tell you what boss, nothing about this is simple.” He shook his head, his horns snagging on leaves and sending them to the ground. “How does he know you’re not betraying him? He spying on you?”

“Magic,” she said. “I’m bound. He doesn’t need to spy on me.”

Bull shuddered. “Always magic.”

“Are we done with the twenty questions?” Speaking to him felt wrong, like she was balancing on a knife-edge, somehow both breaking and not breaking the rules. Errol surveyed his familiar scars and bravado, the easy way he held himself that masked his fierce intelligence. She had missed him so much. It was dangerous, to be so close to her old life. She shouldn’t be engaging like this.

“Just one more.” He fixed her with his one good eye. “Did you leave yourself an out?” She hesitated and he smiled a huge, proud smile. “You did. I knew it. I knew you wouldn’t have come back without a plan.”

“It’s shit,” she said. “Worthless.” He looked at her patiently, waiting, and she sighed. “I made him promise he had nothing to do with my being sent back to Earth. He didn’t.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“Relatively.” He stared at her and she huffed irritably. “I’ve looked into it but haven’t made any headway yet. And I won’t, especially not because _you_ want me to. I can’t betray him, remember? I shouldn’t even be talking to you.”

“But you are. Because you figured it won’t hurt him. And if it won’t hurt him, it’s allowed. All I’m asking is that you keep digging. If there’s nothing to find then there’s no harm done. In fact, if there’s nothing to find, you’re really helping him. No more doubt.”

She pondered it, and it made some strange sense. “Okay.”

He nodded. “Good. We have a plan. Now. Let’s go fight something, for old time’s sake.”

* * *

 

 “Why did you even come back?”

Cassandra’s question was biting and the very first thing she said, charging out from behind a boulder like an angry bull as soon as the rift closed. When Errol just stared at her, she reiterated her question. “Why are you here, Errol? Why did you come back?”

“I--”

Cassandra’s composure was as frayed as Errol had ever seen, her hands clenched, shoulders tight and tense. The sky was a deep, raw blue that day, the air very clear, and the crisp sun highlighted ever fierce and weary line on her face. “Don’t you see what you’ve caused? You must have known this would happen. You knew. You sold yourself to Solas. What on Thedas could have been worth it? Why did you come back?”

“I was Tranquil.”

The truth spilled out unbidden, and Errol wasn’t sure if she regretted it or not. Cassandra abruptly went silent, her mouth slightly agape.

“What?”

“On Earth,” Errol said, feeling some rush of relief as she released it, her terrible burden, the awful memories that still made her wake screaming in the night. “I was Tranquil, or almost so. I had just enough emotion to realize what had been done to me, what I was missing, which was worse, actually. All of the emotional detachment, none of the peace.”

“Dear Maker,” Cassandra breathed, some of her anger lost in the sheer shock of the revelation. “Tranquility? How?”

“There’s practically no magic on Earth. No magic, no Fade. I was cut off. My mind reached for a connection that wasn’t there.”

Cassandra was quiet for a moment, absorbing the new information. “I thought you merely returned because of Cullen, or for personal selfish reasons,” she admitted. “Tranquility… what you did was wrong, but it is more understandable now.”

“I know it was wrong.”

She looked Errol in the eyes, suddenly fierce again. “Even so, I cannot forgive you the damage you’ve caused. There must have been a better way.”

“There wasn’t.”

Cassandra sighed. “Then you shouldn’t have done it, Tranquil or not. As much as it pains me to say it, you shouldn’t have come back. Not like this.”

Errol felt very small in the face of Cassandra’s blunt honesty. “You’re right. I was selfish. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not enough.”

She wanted to shrink into herself. “It’s all I can give.”

Cassandra’s look was piercing. “For now.” There was silence for a moment. “What would you do, if you could be free?”

The question was sudden and unexpected, but Errol had an answer. She thought of it every moment since arriving back in Thedas. “I’d rejoin the Inquisition, if you’d have me. And I’d stop Fen’Harel.”

“Stop, not kill,” Cassandra said sharply. “I find your choice of words telling.”

“Kill if I had to. Stop if I didn’t.”

“Hmph.” Cassandra made a disgruntled noise.

“I know,” Errol said lightly. “I’m the worst.”

Cassandra’s expression didn’t change. “I don’t find sarcasm appropriate here.”

“I was being literal,” Errol said, and despite her half smile her eyes were very sad.

Cassandra surveyed her face. “Oh. You are.” She looked torn between wanting to bluntly agree and the instinctual desire to comfort her friend. She didn’t do either, just looked away, her stern gaze settling on the distance. “If you come out of this on the right side, we will talk. I promise nothing. No matter what happens, I do not know if we can ever go back to what we were.”

“I missed you too, Cassandra,” Errol said gently.

Cassandra looked back, mouth open as if about to protest, but Errol was already gone.

* * *

  
  
“So I hear you have a body that needs rescuing.”

Errol let out a long low breath of relief at the sight of Dorian. He looked impeccable as always, his walk the same elegant swagger, as if every movement were a dance. He even smelled stylish, like some kind of exotic musk.

“I don’t know where it is, and even if I did, how we’d ever get it out without being stopped. We’d need--”

Dorian waved her worry away with one elegant hand. “A massive distraction, yes, but let’s not worry about that part yet. Let’s focus on the finding it part. I have some ideas. Still need to work the kinks out, but they’re very good ideas.”

She grinned a little at his familiar bravado. “Yours always are.”

He smiled back, big and genuine. “I knew I missed you for a reason,” he said, and then stepped closer and took her hand, kissing the back of it before clasping it between his palms. They were warm and smooth despite all the fighting he did, the nails perfectly manicured. “And I have missed you, my friend.”

He was the first person besides Solas to touch her in a very long time. She placed her free hand on top of his, then on impulse leaned in and kissed his cheek. “I miss you so much, Dorian. I really do.”

“Well I’m here now,” he said, squeezing her hands before releasing them. “So don’t look so melancholy. We’ll get you out of this. I promise, and I don’t make promises lightly.”

“I suppose only failure will prove you wrong,” she said wryly.

“And I never fail, so we’re clearly on an excellent track. Now, tell me, because it’s the one question I’ve been unable to puzzle out myself: why did our humor-challenged friend keep your human body alive in the first place? Surely it would have been safer to kill it outright. Unless he can’t?”

“Oh, he can, and will,” she said with a sigh. “And I’ll be even weirder once that happens. It’s collateral. It’s helpful for him to have something to hold over my head until he thinks I’m ready. He also probably doesn’t want me running around at full power until he’s certain I won’t betray him.”

“I thought you couldn’t,” Dorian said, his index finger and thumb gently stroking his mustache as he pondered.

“I’m talking to you, aren’t I?” she asked dryly. “I have to follow the spirit if not the letter of the law. So no betraying him to the Inquisition doesn’t mean I can’t give out innocuous information. Or so Bull tells me and it seems to be working.”

“He is rather cunning for a big lug, isn’t he?” Dorian asked, smiling proudly. “So what would prove that you’re ready to be, ah, ‘killed?’”

She shrugged. “Probably once I help him bring down the veil.”

He blanched. “Ah. Which I assume you won’t do. Not of your own free will, anyway.”

“He can’t force me, and I won’t do it,” she said firmly, and he looked relieved.

“Well, that’s one piece of good news.”

“He doesn’t need me to do it,” she pointed out, and he shrugged elegantly with one shoulder.

“All I care about is that you’re not the one doing it. The rest is details.”

Errol smiled and knew it was tremulous. “So,” she said, and hooked her arm in his like it was the old times. “Tell all about how things are going with you and Bull.” She sighed theatrically. “Just seeing you makes me wish we had some wine.”

His eyes lit up. “You should know by now I always come prepared. Or did you think I was some hedge mage traipsing around the countryside without at least one bottle?”

* * *

  
  
She knew he was there before she saw him. It wasn’t magic, but an inner sense, the hint of some smell on the wind, the feeling of being watched by familiar eyes. She turned as she finished closing the rift and he was there, watching her in the gray pre-dawn light.

For a moment they stared at each other in silence.

“Hello,” she said softly, wincing on the inside over how inadequate a greeting it was. He said nothing, just stood there, wearing once again the familiar fur mantle that made him look like a lion.

“Giving me the silent treatment?” she finally asked when he said nothing. He shook his head as if coming out of a dream.

“I hardly know what to say. I’ve been envisioning this moment for weeks, and now that I’m here I don’t know what to say.” He studied her, amber eyes wary. “I’ve had a letter from Cassandra. She said you were Tranquil. Is this true?”

“Yes.”

He took a step forward. “So that is why…”

“In part,” she said. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

He looked puzzled. “For what?”

“For coming back. Your life would have been a lot better if you’d never seen me again.”

“Don’t say that,” he said, taking another step. He watched her face carefully, steadily, as if trying to memorize it. “Don’t apologize for being in my life. We will… we will find a way to break this hold he has over you, we will free you.” He was too close, and there was something too much like hope in his eyes. “Errol, I promise--”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” she said shortly, looking away. She couldn’t stand him looking at her like that, like nothing had changed. Like there was anything to be hopeful about.

He shook his head, one hand reached out imploringly. “We will find a way.”

She turned away. “I should go.”

He made a frustrated noise. “I don’t understand you, if you would only speak to me we could--”

“I’m sleeping with him.”

She said it loudly and pointedly. She wanted it to hurt. She wanted him to give up and go away and forget her.

Cullen’s hand dropped and curled into a fist. “Did he force you?”

“No.”

“Ah.” He shook his head slowly. His shoulders sagged and Errol saw the hope in his eyes flicker and go out. Everything about him looked very tired. “I don’t see how it matters, then. We will find a way.”

“I--”

“If you think I would not rescue you out of pain or petty jealousy, then perhaps you don’t know me at all, Serah Kerr.”

Errol felt like she had been struck. “Oh,” she said stiffly. Her voice wobbled, and his eyes softened, but she straightened and bit back the tears. “I’m glad we know where things stand between us.”

He seemed to regret his words. “Errol, I--”

She waved him off with something between a little laugh and a small cry. “No no, I brought that on myself. I’ve brought all of this on myself.” She was quiet for a moment. “I came back for you, you know? That’s what’s so funny. I came back for you, and now--”

There was no good way to end that sentence. She rubbed her embarrassingly wet eyes and started to walk away. He called back.

“Do you love him?”

She spun around. “How can you even ask me that?!”

“Then why?”

“I don’t know!” she yelled, losing her composure. “I don’t know, I’ve been asking myself why since the beginning!” She went quiet again, the fire gone. “I was just so tired of fighting all the time and being alone and I just… I guess I just lost hope.” She shook her head, mulling it over, slowly coming to the conclusion that had eluded her for so long. “No, that’s not it. I wanted to lose hope. I wanted to know that there was nothing to come back to, so I wouldn’t have to hope anymore.”

“You sabotaged yourself,” he said quietly.

“Burned all my bridges,” she said with a shrug and a little smile. “Some hero, huh?”

He didn’t say anything, face carefully blank.

Errol turned and left. This time he didn’t stop her.

* * *

  
  
Cole didn’t need to wait by a rift. He found her in the Fade, flickering and almost too human to be there, trespassing on a land that was no longer his and would soon reject him all together. He said nothing, just held her with ephemeral arms, and there alone did she let herself cry.

* * *

 

  
Varric looked far too jaunty, Bianca slung over his shoulder, his shirt somehow unbuttoned even more than usual. “There’s my Sunshine,” he said, squinting and surveying her in the bright afternoon light. “When this is all over I’m definitely writing another book.”

Errol sat down hard on the trampled grass, legs crossed. She was starting to get a headache, even though that wasn’t technically possible anymore. “Come on, not you too. Varric, you know I love seeing you but it’s hopeless, you have to know that.”

He looked unconcerned. “Probably. Doesn’t mean I’m not going to try.”

Errol wanted to scream. Couldn’t anyone see it was pointless? “Why is everyone so determined to save me?”

“Because we’re your friends, Sunshine,” Varric said, as if was as simple as that. “I mean, come on. You saved the world. The least we can do is save you.”

Her throat closed and against her will her right hand fluttered to her lips as if pressing back a keen. She blinked hard and looked away. “It can’t be done.”

“Let us worry about that.”

“Even if you could find me, and get me out, my body is being kept alive with magic. Without a soul it’s probably on the brink of death. Take that magic away and I’m not even sure I’d survive the transition of my spirit back into the body.”

He still looked unconcerned. “You were kept alive in your world.”

“We have better medicine than you do.”

He pondered this. “So what you’re saying is you need a healer.”

“An incredible, out of this world healer.”

Varric grinned his huge, confident grin, his eyes alight with the thrill of a good story. “Well, wouldn’t you know it? It just so happens I know the best healer in all of Thedas.” He tapped his chin, eyes far away, already scheming. “Now all I have to do is find him.”

Errol felt something long dead flicker inside of her for the first time since she was Tranquil. It was an emotion so foreign it took her until long after Varric had finally left and the first stars dotted the sky to identify it as hope.

 

 

 


	13. Hawke Hunt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A dwarf, an elf, an abomination, and a once-spirit walk into the Fade...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m aliiiiiive! Thank you so much to VerityGray for being my lovely beta and catching all the little inconsistencies that crop up with such a long story. And thank you as always to everyone who has stuck with me this far!
> 
> And now, for something completely different!

**CHAPTER 13: Hawke Hunt**

 

Summerday Hawke sits in her house. Her mother is upstairs.

She hears the shuffle and bump of footsteps above, the creak of the floorboards under bare feet. Next to her, the fire snaps and pops, casting dim red light across the room. Hawke doesn’t move. She knows that eventually her mother will come down the stairs. Say her name, her full name, as only she ever did. Summerday, the holiday that marked her birth. _Summerday,_ she’ll say. _Summerday, I’m cold._

Hawke knows this because it’s happened before, many times.

The front door opens.

This is new. The house usually doesn’t have doors.

Hawke looks. She knows she shouldn’t, she’s so _tired,_ but she’s curious. Always curious. Always willing to open her mouth and swallow whatever they stuff down her gullet.

It’s Varric.

He looks hale and healthy, if not a little green around the edges, nervous in the way only a dwarf in the Fade can be. She’s seen him many times before, but never quite like this. Gray streaks his hair.

He’s accompanied by a thin, twitchy boy. She’s never seen him before, and yet he seems familiar, as if she had met him once upon a time, the memories like looking through water. Maybe she is finally losing her mind.

Of course Anders and Fenris are there. What would a good nightmare be without them? Anders’ eyes shine blue. She’s surprised - Justice has never appeared to her before. Anders looks bedraggled, like he had been dragged through the mud for years. Rough patches mar his face, as if he had shaved with a dull blade. Circles ring his glowing eyes. He looks older too, which is surprising. Usually they never look older, torn from her memories, static and frozen in time.

The ceiling creaks. Feet slowly thump toward the stairs.

Fenris locks eyes with her. He’s shining and silver, thinner than he should be, the line of his collarbone too sharp. His sword is drawn, the giant blade covered in crimson and muck. His hair is long, pulled into a low ponytail that nearly touches his shoulder blades. The leather of his armor is dirty but well-oiled and well-kept.

Her heart swells. She fruitlessly tries to push the emotion back. Even after all this time, his image still affects her. And so lifelike. So real. She can smell him, metal and blood and lyrium and spice. So real.

But not real. For one thing, he’d never be here with _Anders._

“Hawke,” he says in a low voice. Only someone who knew him very well would hear the relief. So real. He moves toward her, sheathing his sword on his back.

Hawke draws her blades.

Everything stops, the only noise the crackle of the fire and the uneven, heavy shuffle of feet upstairs.

“How many times have we been over this? Waffles, daggers are for the bad guys, not your friends,” Varric says. His light tone doesn’t disguise his nervousness.

“Hawke,” Fenris says again.

“She doesn’t think you’re you,” the boy says. “She thinks we’re like the others. Shadows on the wall. Patched and frayed. Not real.” He raises his eyes to the ceiling, as if seeing through it to the body above. “The Nightmare likes to play.”

“Get out,” Hawke says. Her voice comes out rough from disuse. “I’ve killed you enough times that I’m tired of it. Your tricks won’t work. Just leave.”

“Waffles, it’s really us,” Varric says. “We came into the damn Fade for you. We’re here to take you home.”

“How many times you’ve come for me,” she snarls. “I’m done.”

“It’s _us,_ ” Varric says.

“It’s never you!” she shouts, and raises her blades.

“Summer,” Fenris says quietly, his voice like whiskey and smoke. The voice that made her fall in love with him the moment they met.

Whatever he’s about to say is cut off by the shadow at the top of the stairs. Her mother moves, step by step, down and down.

“Leandra,” Varric breathes.

“No,” the boy says.

“Summerday,” her mother says. “Summerday, I’m cold.”

“That’s because you’re dead,” Hawke says flatly.

Her mother moves into the light and everyone but the boy draws a quick, sharp breath.

Varric grimaces. “Aw, _fuck_.”

The walking corpse is stitched from many people, Leandra’s head atop a stranger’s shoulders, the eyes not her own. “I’m cold,” she says. Her dress is long and white. There is a tattered veil on her forehead. “Summerday, help me. Save me. Summerday. Summerday, why did you let me die?”

Hawke screams. No matter how many times it happens she always screams. She lunges forward, blades drawn, and severs her mother’s head from the stranger’s neck.

Even as it falls it continues to plead with her, until the house and the body and everything vanishes.

Hawke closes her eyes and breathes deep. Another nightmare gone. She wonders when the next will start up.

“That was some _fucked up shit,_ ” Varric says.

Hawke opens her eyes and turns, surprised. “You’re still here.”

“Where else would we be?” the boy asks, as if confused.

Hawke crouches, weapons brandished, ready to fight. “What kind of trick is this? What is the Nightmare planning?”

“No trick,” Fenris says. His eyes are silver in this swirling void between Nightmare-warped memories. Above him the Black City looms, close but just out of reach. “I never gave up. We’re taking you home.”

He seems too real, more than he ever has before. There is a new scar on his chin and dirt under his nails. “Fenris would never travel the Fade again, especially not with Justice.”

“He seeks to save you, as does Anders,” Justice booms. “I suggest you let them.”

She feels doubt worm its way through her heart. It’s a dangerous feeling. “What on Thedas would bring Justice, Fenris, Varric, and some kid I don’t know back into the Fade after all this time?” She’s suddenly uncertain. “Time _has_ passed, hasn’t it?”

“A couple years,” Varric says, and there’s shame in his voice and his face. “I’m so sorry, Hawke. If we had known you were still alive--”

“Cole,” the boy says abruptly, and she sizes him up.

“What?”

“My name is Cole,” he says. “I wasn’t quite real the last time we met; I’m not quite real now. But I’m more real. Almost real. You’ll remember me this time. Everyone does. I fit. Not here, but in the outside world. I’m more solid, now.”

She glares at him. Varric puts a hand on his arm. “We got this, Cole,” he says gently.

“She doesn’t _believe_ us!” he says, almost a whine. “The Nightmare’s done too much, taken your faces too many times. She thinks we’re the Nightmare, come to cut again.”

“Weird kid gets it,” Hawke says, and the boy sighs.

“It’s _Cole_.”

“I have been searching for you since the day I received Varric’s raven,” Fenris says, his voice a calm and steady lifeline in the confusion. “No one believed there was a way. So I hunted the abomination. He knew of the Fade. Varric is a… complication.”

“I like to call it luck,” Varric says, attempting his cheerful voice. “Come on, Broody. You know you would never have made it here if it wasn’t for me.”

“She wouldn’t have been here in the first place if it wasn’t for you and your damned Inquisitor!” Fenris snarls.

Hawke holds up her hands. This argument feels too familiar, a sourness so real she can taste it on her tongue. “Okay, okay. Let’s say, hypothetically, that you’re not just another of the Nightmare’s games. Tell me how you got here, from the beginning.” She looks at Fenris sternly, her blades still drawn. “Keep him honest,” she says, and Fenris nods.

Varric cracks his knuckles, pleased at the chance to tell a story. “You want the truth, Waffles? It’ll take a while. But let’s just say we need a healer for a friend, and we need the best around. I’ve been keeping tabs on Blondie for a few years, but I didn’t know I wasn’t the only one hunting him…”

* * *

  
_Three days ago_

 

“I’m starting to think you don’t know where you’re going.”

Varric brushed off Cullen’s concerns with a wave. “Curly, at what point did I give you the impression I knew where I was going?”

The heavy footsteps behind him stopped. Varric turned to see Cullen frozen in place, a frown on his face.

“You don’t know where we’re going? I thought you had spies?”

“I have people, not spies. Friends.”

“Friends who spy.”

Varric waved him off again and kept walking. “Semantics, Curly. My friends report when they get rumors of him. It’s enough to give me a general area. There aren’t little numbers on the caves letting me know which one is his.”

Cullen finally snapped out of his shock and jogged to catch up to the dwarf. “Rumors? We’ve been out here for weeks because of _rumors_? Why wasn’t I told?”

“Because I knew you’d react like this.”

“But you know he’s in a cave.”

“I assume he’s holed up in a cave. Look around us. These mountains are full of ‘em. Where else would he be?”

“Do you know _anything_?” Cullen asked, exasperated.

“I know you need a drink,” Varric said brightly. “Next tavern we hit, first round’s on me.”

They’d been traveling through the Vimmark mountains for three weeks. Varric’s spies (and they were spies, if he was really honest with himself) had placed Anders somewhere in the western fringe of the mountain range as little as six days before they set out.

It hadn’t been a fun trip for Varric. He didn’t want to travel alone, as he thrived on conversation, but he wouldn’t have picked his traveling companions if he’d had the choice. He had a deep fondness for the kid, but talking to him was like pulling teeth, and Curly was fun to needle but that was about it.

Honestly, Varric had wondered more than once what the former Inquisitor saw in him.

Well, even if Curly wasn’t the best conversationalist, he was here, and for that Varric gave him credit. He could have stayed at Skyhold. He could have traveled to some of the remaining rifts to bolster the troops. He could have continued searching for temples. Instead, he was here, letting Varric tease him, unswaying in his devotion to find a cure for Sunshine’s out-of-body problem.

“He’s good for her,” Cole said softly at Varric’s elbow, and Varric jumped. Even though the kid was now mostly human he was still far too quiet for Varric’s liking. “Calm and steady and strong. It’s not for you to understand. It’s not yours.”

Varric felt a pang as he thought of his own lost love, far away with her stupid husband and her stupid, beautiful eyes. Her namesake rested on his back, his anchor, his ball and chain. “Yeah, I get it. Thanks, kid.”

“Do you hear that?” Cullen asked, and drew his sword with a grace that belied his larger frame. Varric noted it and filed it away for his next book.

He slung Bianca off of his back and listened. He did hear sounds - the sounds of fighting. The sounds of very familiar fighting.

Varric grinned. “Curly, you just found what we’ve been looking for.”

He hurried up the path before Cullen could question him. He was quiet on his feet, much quieter than most dwarves, who tended to stomp around as if making up for their short stature. Years of sneaking had made him the quietest dwarf he’d ever known, and it was a very useful skill when trying to observe, say, an enraged glowing elf and a frustrated abomination.

“-- times are you going to attempt to beat the answer out of me?” Anders’ voice wafted through the air. It sounded weary.

“Until you tell the truth!” Fenris’ voice snarled.

Varric moved into position behind a clump of rocks and surveyed the situation. Fenris was glowing, of course, and he held Anders against one of the boulders that thrust up from the earth like scattered eggs. His hands, still encased in their metal talons, clutched at the front of Anders’ filthy robes, and his snarling face was mere inches from the abomination’s.

To Anders’ credit, he didn’t look afraid, only annoyed. Life had clearly been hard on him since Kirkwall. His stubble was patchy, like he had taken a dull knife to a long beard, and his eyes were ringed in pale blue. He was very thin, and very dirty. He looked like a bag of sticks held together by tattered robes and will, and the will was almost gone. He looked tired.

“I’m telling the truth. I’ve _been_ telling the truth. I have no way into the Fade; I never have. Believe me, I’ve tried. You’re not the only one who wants Hawke rescued.”

“Lies,” Fenris said. He shook Anders hard. “You’ve never cared about anyone who wasn’t one of your precious mages.” He spat the last word like it was poison.

Anders laughed then, but there was no amusement in it. “You’re also not the only one who loved her. If you can’t see that, you’d better just kill me now, because I’ll never get through to you.”

Fenris seemed to consider this. Varric decided it was time to emerge.

“I hate to break up the party, but I didn’t come all this way for you to murder my healer, Broody.”

Fenris dropped Anders and whipped around, one hand drawing the huge greatsword on his back. He crouched, then seemed to register who was there. His glow faded, leaving only a dirty and exhausted elf behind. “Varric?”

“Glad to see your eyes are still working,” Varric said as he ambled forward. He gestured to the sword. “Mind putting that away?”

Fenris complied, but still looked wary. “What are you doing here?”

“Ears don’t work, though,” Varric mused, deliberately staying light to keep Fenris off balance. He knew this would be tricky, and if he didn’t say exactly the right thing Anders would die, and then they’d all be up shit creek. “I said I’m here for the healer.” He nodded pointedly at the bedraggled mage. “I’m here for him.”

“I don’t know how you found us,” Fenris said, “and you are my friend, Varric. But the abomination is mine. I’ve been hunting him for a long time. I will not allow him to escape now.”

“I don’t think you have a choice,” Cullen said, appearing from around the bend. His sword was drawn.

Varric wanted to slap himself in the face. Why did no one ever _listen_ to him? Why was no one ever open to just _talking_?

Fenris surveyed Cullen flatly, surprised but not showing it. “You.”

Anders wasn’t as subdued. “Knight-Captain?” he asked incredulously. “What the hell are _you_ doing here?” He swung on Varric. “What is this, Varric? Are you going to drag me to a circle after all this time?”

“Even you have to know I haven’t been a Templar for a long time,” Cullen said, and even though his sword was still drawn the set of his shoulders was suddenly wearier, as if remembering something he’d tried to forget.

“Ah, yes, Commander of the Inquisition. Quite the promotion, eh, _Knight Captain?_ ” Anders’ voice was acid. “Forgive me if I doubt your sudden magnanimity toward mages. Once a Templar, always a Templar.”

“There are no more Circles,” Cullen said steadily, refusing to rise to the bait.

“I don’t trust the College of Enchanters,” Anders snapped. “They only have their freedom because of me, yet most of them still want me dead.”

“You _destroyed the Chantry with the Reverend Mother still inside_ ,” Fenris growled.

“I did what I had to do free--”

“You’re nothing but a mur--”

“Kids, kids, please,” Varric said loudly, holding out his hands. Anders and Fenris both swung their baleful glares on him, but he didn’t flinch. “As much as I’ve missed your bickering, we have a reason for being here.”

“You’re not having him,” Fenris insisted.

“For once I agree,” Anders said, glaring at Cullen distrustfully. “If my other option is the Knight-Captain, I’ll take my chances with the elf. At least Fenris will just kill me, not put me under the brand.”

“I am not a Templar anymore, and I wouldn’t do that, even to you!” Cullen snapped. “If you had any idea--”

“ENOUGH!” Cole said loudly. Even though he was no longer a spirit he was still preternaturally quiet, and had slipped beside Varric without anyone noticing. “This isn’t helping!”

“Who--” Anders started.

“The kid is right,” Varric said without answering the question. “We can bicker later.” He turned to Fenris, and his voice deepened, any trace of lightness gone from his face. “I need him, Fenris. For the number of times I’ve saved your ass, you owe me that much.”

Fenris’ mouth twisted into something approaching wry humor. “You know my name. I’ve wondered.” He suddenly turned somber again. “I can’t, Varric. I also need him.”

“You need him dead? After all this time?”

“He wants to rescue Hawke from the Fade,” Anders said wearily. “And he won’t listen to me when I say I can’t help him.”

“Lies,” Fenris said flatly. One clawed hand curled into a fist. “He has a demon inside of him. If anyone knows--”

“Hawke is dead,” Varric said. Short and to the point. If he lingered on the thought for too long it would open up a wound inside of him that best stayed closed. “Has been for a long time now.”

“She’s--”

“And even if she wasn’t, there’s no way physically into the Fade,” Varric said, pressing on, trying to get this ludicrous conversation over with. “Not even for our possessed friend.”

“Think about it, Fenris,” Anders said, something sad and almost gentle in his voice. “If Justice knew of a way back into the Fade, wouldn’t he have gone a long time ago? He was trapped here the moment he crossed over. It’s why he needed me in the first place.”

Fenris shook his head. “I can’t believe that. Hawke is alive, and as long as she is alive I will not give up.”

“What makes you think she’s alive?” Varric asked. Fenris set his jaw.

“She is. She must be.”

“You weren’t there,” Varric said. A headache was brewing between his eyes. He’d done such a good job not thinking about Hawke, except for late at night, except for the screaming dreams. “No one could have survived the Nightmare. It was massive. It controlled everything. Believe me, if I for one second thought there was a chance she survived, I would have begged the Inquisitor to open a rift myself. But to go back there would have spelled death for us all. We barely escaped as it was.”

“The Inquisitor could open a rift into the Fade?” Fenris asked, perking up. He looked warily hopeful, a new target sighted in his mind. “I thought she only closed them.”

“Doesn’t matter now,” Varric said shortly. “She’s gone. A fact I’m trying to rectify, but I need the mage.”

“Wait, what? Why?” Anders asked, at the same time that Fenris snarled “Explain, dwarf,” and Cole piped up helpfully, “She’s not really gone.”

“Enough, all of you,” Cullen said. He sheathed his sword and looked over at Varric. “How on Thedas did you work with these two for _years_? It’s like herding cats.”

“Yeah, cats that can rip a man’s heart out of his chest and sometimes blow up buildings,” Varric said wryly. “It wasn’t easy, Curly, I’ll tell you that much.”

Both Anders and Fenris opened their mouths, but Cullen held out his hands.

“Please,” he said, firmly enough that it didn’t sound like a request. “Let me speak.” They glared at him, but fell silent. “You don’t like me. I understand. I don’t like who I was in Kirkwall either, and I will never stop attempting to atone for my actions there. But I am not that person anymore. I am not a Templar anymore.” He took a deep breath. “I do not take lyrium and have not for several years.” He saw the surprise on Anders’ face. Fenris stayed impassive, possibly not understanding the significance of that statement. “I’m not asking you to trust me. I’m asking you to trust Varric, your friend. We’re here to save the Inquisitor. She’s alive, but in danger, and to save her we need the best healer in Thedas.” He looked directly at Anders, a cool, steady stare that belied nothing of his conflicting emotions. He never thought he’d be begging the abomination who blew up the Chantry for help, but strange times made for strange bedfellows. “Varric insists that man is you.”

“Why are you here?” Anders asked. “You, personally? She’s a mage, isn’t she?”

“She’s more than that.” He made himself not break Anders’ gaze, man to exhausted man. “I’m here because I love her.”

Anders looked appropriately dumbstruck. Varric let out a cough that might have been covering a laugh.

“Touching as that sentiment is, I’m still here to rescue Hawke,” Fenris said. “I don’t see why I should let me best chance walk away with you.”

“For Andraste’s sake, Broody, we already told you--” Varric started, exasperation showing in his voice.

“He’s not your best chance,” Cole said serenely. “The Inquisitor is.”

Fenris looked at Cole like he would an annoying ant. “The former Inquisitor isn’t available. Isn’t that the whole reason you’re here?”

“Who _are_ you?” asked Anders.

“I’m Cole,” he said brightly. “I help people. I can reach Errol. She can open a rift. We can save your friend.”

Silence fell. Varric heard the breeze, the call of the mountain hawks, the leaves whispering together in the trees. “Kid, are you telling me that Hawke really is alive?”

Cole shook his head, sandy hair falling into his eyes under the hat. “I don’t know. The Nightmare keeps his castle close. Not even Errol can see inside. Hidden, haunted, locked up tight. But she can open the door, if you want to step through.”

“Yes,” Fenris said immediately.

“Look, I want to rescue Hawke as much as anyone,” Varric said shortly. “You don’t think I’ve imagined charging in to save her a thousand times? She’s dead. The Nightmare swallowed her whole. If we go in there to get her body, we’ll join her, and too much is riding on us to die now. I want to, you know I do, but I also don’t want to die for nothing.”

“I did not imagine you a coward, Varric,” Fenris said acidly.

“I’m a realist,” Varric snapped. “Hawke was my best friend. I’d die for her. But she wouldn’t want us to die for nothing.”

“I don’t care,” Fenris said. “You want the abomination? You can have him… as soon as we return from the Fade with Hawke or her body.”

Varric found himself fish-gaping at the pronouncement, but Cullen didn’t hesitate. “Deal.”

Varric swung on him. “Are you kidding me, Curly? Did you not hear me say if we go we all die?”

“Unless you suggest we attack them, I don’t see another option,” Cullen said icily.

“I think you’re afraid we’ll find her alive,” Fenris said, his voice stone and gravel. “You couldn’t live with the guilt if you knew you left her there to rot.”

Varric flinched, and looked away, for once with nothing to say. He felt the weight of Fenris’ words sink down on him, an anchor pulling him under the water he’d been so desperately treading for years now.

“It’s settled then,” Cullen said. “We find out the truth about Serrah Hawke, and then return to Skyhold with the mage.”

“I have a name, and no one’s asked me what I want to do!” Anders said petulantly. Fenris made as if to unsheathe his greatsword again, and Anders took a step back. “I want to rescue Hawke, but I don’t think going with the Knight-Captain into the heart of the Inquisition is a good idea, not if I want my head to stay attached to my neck. The new Inquisitor is a _Seeker_ , and don’t think I don’t know she’s looked for me herself. I’ll be dead before I pass through the gates.”

Varric found his voice again. He looked up, and tried to sound as normal as possible. “Normally, Blondie, I’d agree with you, but this is too important. You’re not going to die, or be turned Tranquil, or anything else. Do this for us, and you’re a free man. A hero, even. We’ll set you up somewhere safe, somewhere better than a cave. Now I’m not saying people are just gonna forget about what you did, but saving the Inquisitor? Averting a war between the elves and everyone else? That’s a lotta points in your favor.”

“A war with the elves?” Fenris asked, suddenly interested. “You’re talking about the dreams. They’re real? Fen’Harel is alive?”

“Alive and building an army, and I have a feeling our former Inquisitor is the only one who can stop him. But she needs our help first.” He turned to Anders. “What do you say, Blondie? You broke the world once. Ready to help fix it?”

Anders hesitated, then finally nodded. “I am.”

“And your… friend?”

“This is a just cause. Justice and I are united in this.”

“Good. Great. Okay.” Varric clapped his hands together and rubbed them nervously. “Bianca needs more arrows, and we need bombs. Lots of bombs. If we’re going to survive the Fade, we need to get to work.”

* * *

  
_Present Day_

 

Hawke holds up her hands. “Wait wait wait. Former Knight Captain, mages-aren’t-people-like-you-and-me, stick-up-his-ass Rutherford is here? To save the former Inquisitor? A _mage_?? Because he’s in LOVE with her???”

“She’s not really a mage,” Cole pipes up helpfully.

Varric elbows him. “Yeah. All that.”

Hawke shakes her head. “Then it’s gotta be true. I mean, he did stand up to Meredith in the end, and I knew he left the Templars for his Inquisition gig, but damn. Even the Nightmare couldn’t have come up with that kind of plot twist.” She eyes Varric. “So what happened next?”

Varric shrugs. “It was simple, really. Cole called up a favor with the former Inquisitor. He, ah, has a connection with her. Before we knew it, bam: a portal to the Nightmare’s realm. Apparently it’s simultaneously always moving and accessible from everywhere, because everyone has nightmares? I don’t know, I’m a dwarf, I’m not even supposed to be here. It’s taken us a couple days and a _lot_ of bombs fired at a _lot_ of spiders, but we made it.”

“And the Nightmare?”

“Hasn’t shown itself,” he says, and there’s a nervousness he can’t hide on his face. “Must be too scared to face Bianca.”

Hawke looks at Anders. “Justice?”

“It is close,” he booms. “A foul, unjust thing. It waits. For what I do not know.”

“So maybe we should leave before it makes up its mind and decides to eat us all,” Varric says, glancing at the ominous black nothing around them.

“Where’s Rutherford?” Hawke asks.

“Guarding the rift and killing anything that tries to get out,” Varric says. “Once we’re back through it’ll close behind us. Don’t ask how, I don’t understand it. Can we _go_?”

“I, too, would like to leave this place,” Fenris says. He looks at Hawke but does not reach for her; he knows she won’t accept it. Not here. “Don’t you?”

Hawke hesitates. She wants to leave, more than anything. She’s wanted to leave for years, from the moment she felt this cold clammy not-air on her skin. But to go with them would be accepting that they are real. If they aren’t, she’ll be offering up the last of her tender heart on a platter for the Nightmare to feast upon. If they aren’t, she’ll lose the last of her sanity.

Somewhere close, the Nightmare laughs, and she hears its voice for the first time in a long time.

_‘You’ll never know, will you, little Hawke? Every time you close your eyes, you’ll wonder: Will you wake up back here?’_

“Let’s go,” Hawke says. She sheathes her blades. “It won’t stop us.”

She makes her choice.

The Nightmare laughs.

They run, through the muck and grime, through puddles of dark water and mist, the Black City above them like a wound. They run, without getting winded, without tiring, the Fade’s fake reality only giving the impression of distance. There are no spiders, no little nightmares. There is nothing.

Too soon they see the rift, the real world sparkling beyond it like a mirage. Anders bursts through first, then Varric. Hawke hesitates.

“If you do not go, neither will I,” Fenris says quietly from beside her. He has still not tried to touch her. “I will not leave you again.”

She hates that she can still cry, but her eyes fill with tears. She steps through the rift into daylight. She would never leave him in darkness.

The rift ripples and closes the moment Fenris exits behind her. They are free.

* * *

  
  
Cullen watched them tumble through the rift with no small amount of shock. Part of him had believed that this mad plan wouldn’t work, that they would die in there and his only chance of saving Errol would die with them. But here they were, after days in the dark: Anders blinking the blue from his eyes as he retook control, Varric looking sick and dazed, and Fenris stern and seemingly emotionless behind a bedraggled Hawke.

_Summerday Hawke was alive._ He could barely believe it. He leaned heavy on his sword and wiped the muck and black blood from his forehead. This mad plan just might work.

Hawke bent over, shaking. Her face was exactly the same as it had been when she vanished into the Nightmare’s realm, frozen by the Fade. Her hair was just as red, but her skin, always pink and sun-warmed, was pale as milk under the moon, pale enough it looked tinted blue. Her eyes, the blue-grey of a storm, were dull. She looked haunted, and scared. She tilted her chin up and gazed at the clear sky with something like sadness.

Fenris quietly rested his hand on the back of her neck. She leaned into him. She was smaller even than the elf, shockingly small for being so deadly. Cullen had seen her daggers at work; she was fast, and moved like a dance. It’s how she killed the Arishok. He never wanted to go up against the tiny woman in battle.

“Is this real?” she asked softly.

“I am here,” he said simply. “We are free.”

She drew in a deep breath, then straightened and looked over as if noticing Cullen for the first time. “You look… dirty.”

He shrugged. “Demons.”

“Ah.” She smiled then, a ghost of her old bright smile. “Good to see you,” she said with surprising sincerity. “Knight-Captain.”

“I’m not--” he started, but stopped when he saw the twinkle in her eye. She would be okay, he decided, if she was still able to tease him.

Varric looked green around the gills. “I feel like that was too easy. Why didn’t it appear? Why didn’t it fight?”

“I know exactly why,” Hawke said with a sigh. “It gets more fear this way. In there, I knew what was happening, I was tired, I hated, but I wasn’t afraid. It couldn’t get anything from me anymore. Now… I am afraid.” She looked around shivered. “I think I always will be.”

“This is real, Waffles,” Varric said gently. She looked unconvinced.

“Maybe. But I’ll never know.”  
“You will,” Cullen said, surprising them all. He pulled something small from his pocket and crouched. “I know what it is to fear the Fade, to not be able to distinguish between reality and a waking nightmare. But now I know the trick.” He flicked his fingers, and a top spun wildly on the rocks. “The Fade can imitate reality but not perfect it. In the Fade, there is no breeze or cracks in the rock, not really. The top will spin, forever, because it’s not real.”

They all watched the top spin. It seemed to go on too long. Finally it wavered, then wobbled, then toppled, and Cullen looked satisfied.

“You’re safe, Serrah Hawke.” He stood and tucked the top back into his pocket.

Cole’s eyes were wide. “Errol taught you that,” he said softly. “You still carry it, even now.”

Cullen’s throat felt suddenly too tight. He looked away. “Always.”

Hawke seemed cautiously hopeful. “Neat trick,” she said. “I’ll have to try it myself, once we get to Skyhold.”

“You’re coming?” Cullen supposed he shouldn’t be surprised. She never could keep herself out of trouble.

“‘Course I’m coming,” she said. “Averting a war? Unwinnable battles? Just up my alley. Plus I need to keep an eye on Ser Desperately-Needs-A-Bath over here.”

“Hey!” Anders said, but he was smiling, and something in him looked less weary.

Varric had wandered away. Hawke traced the path of his boots with her eyes. “I’ll be right back,” she said. She kissed Fenris, tentatively, as if still expecting him to go up in smoke. Then she followed Varric.

Cullen went looking for them when they hadn’t reappeared an hour later. He descended the mountain and came upon a small overlook to see them sitting below, shoulder to shoulder. Hawke’s arm was around the dwarf’s back.

He was crying.

Cullen had never seen Varric cry. Not after the explosion at the Conclave, not after the fall of Haven. Not even after Adamant. He cried like the sobs were wrenched from the deepest part of him, hard and painful. He clutched Hawke and sobbed, and she held him.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he said. She let out a gentle series of _shhh, shhh_ sounds and kissed his forehead.

“I know. I know. I forgive you.”

Cullen turned and left as quietly as he had come. He knew the guilt that came from not being able to save the person you care about most in the world. At least now, Varric had his best friend back, and could begin to heal. Cullen wondered if he would ever be that lucky.

He clutched the top in his pocket. Step one was complete. They’d done the impossible: Acquired the best healer in Thedas.

Now they just needed to keep Cassandra from killing him.

 

 


End file.
